


Classics and Moderns

by JoyAndOtherStories



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Professors, American setting, Angst with a Happy Ending, Gabriel is a bundle of unacknowledged privilege in a suit, Good AUmens AU Festival, He/Him Pronouns For Aziraphale (Good Omens), He/Him Pronouns For Crowley (Good Omens), Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), M/M, Mutual Pining, One brief incident of Gabriel-typical fat-shaming that gets shut down immediately, Pining, Professors, Slow Burn, They/Them Pronouns for Beelzebub (Good Omens), They/Them Pronouns for Uriel (Good Omens), This story is about Aziraphale and Crowley so don't worry about him anyway
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-04
Updated: 2020-08-26
Packaged: 2021-03-03 19:54:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 36,812
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24531130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoyAndOtherStories/pseuds/JoyAndOtherStories
Summary: Aziraphale Fell is a freshly-tenured professor of Classical Literature in the Department of Literature and Language Arts at Tadfield University. He knows perfectly well that his newest colleague, Anthony Crowley, is supposed to be his rival and would never find him interesting anyway. Nobody ever finds him interesting for very long.Anthony Crowley, professor of Contemporary Literary Expression, tries to keep a strict policy regarding relationships of any type: Avoid them or end them before they can hurt you. That's part of the reason he's starting yet another university position at Tadfield University. He's tired of adjusting to new places, but he has no plans to make friends here, and certainly wouldn't be compatible with the stuffy Aziraphale Fell.(Yeah, right. We know how this goes.)
Relationships: Anathema Device/Newton Pulsifer, Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens), Beelzebub/Gabriel (Good Omens)
Comments: 623
Kudos: 406
Collections: Good AUmens AU Fest, Good Omens Human AUs





	1. Swords and Sunglasses

**Author's Note:**

> A few content warnings:  
> \--Gabriel gaslights and may not even be aware that he's doing it, the berk  
> \--Gabriel briefly fat-shames Aziraphale in Ch. 3 but gets shut down immediately  
> \--Aziraphale attends a very affirming church  
> \--Religion gets discussed a few times  
> \--Homophobia gets discussed a couple of times but won't occur in the story

Anthony Crowley glowered at the unfinished state of his new office. It would need a good bit of work to get it up to his standards. At least he had a few plants installed at good focal points, but clunky, passed-down university furniture didn’t lend itself to the clean lines and minimalist aesthetic that helped him focus best. At the moment, his current project—setting up his extensive speaker system—would have to be put on hold while he trudged across campus (in the rain) to some sort of orientation meeting that he knew would be tedious as well as irrelevant to his actual job. He’d been through more than his share of university orientations at this point and was tiresomely familiar with how they went. He gave the room one last glare, for good measure, checked his pocket for his new set of keys, and let the door close.

The Department of Literature and Language Arts, on a Friday afternoon two weeks before the start of the semester, was predictably a ghost town. Crowley told himself that this was fine; it was probably best to have some time to adjust to his physical surroundings before also having to adjust to other people. Not that he would have _minded_ a bit of company, or even a gossip about departmental politics so that he could start preparing himself for whatever he would have to deal with, this time around—right. Whatever. Happy to be alone. Definitely.

He paused for a moment, taking in the feel of the place, the universal smell of aging university buildings that spoke of old books and shelves of periodicals and creaky wooden desks and worn tile floors and staircases with one step just a bit higher than the others—

And unexpectedly heard an aggrieved sigh from somewhere down the hall. He followed the noise, startlingly relieved to hear evidence of another human in the vicinity.

The sigh, as it turned out, had come from an office a few doors away. Crowley’s first impression was of masses of unstable piles of books, framing a dusty window with a view of the thunderstorm that had persisted all day, before a fluffy cloud of white-blond hair arose from behind an exceptionally cluttered desk with a distressingly ancient computer.

For a moment Crowley actually considered whether he was meeting the resident ghost of the building. Besides the nearly-white hair and the out-of-date computer, the man facing him was dressed in clothes that had to be at least fifty years out of style—an actual waistcoat and bowtie, for starters—

“Oh—ah—hello.” Even his voice sounded out of date. “I don’t believe we’ve met?”

“Uh,” said Crowley, “I’m Crowley.” Was there a protocol for introducing oneself to a ghost?

“Oh yes, Anthony J. Crowley,” the apparition said. “I was out of town when you interviewed, but of course I’ve seen your CV.” He turned as if to come around his desk, but was stymied by several piles of books. “Ah—apologies; I’m a bit trapped here.” He reached awkwardly over the desk for a handshake. His hand was plump and smooth, and both too warm and too firm to belong to a ghost. “Welcome to Tadfield University,” he added with a smile.

Crowley had heard about smiles that lit up a room, but had never experienced one until now. He blinked behind his sunglasses.

“I’m Aziraphale,” the apparently-not-a-ghost continued. “Classical literature.”

“Aziraphale,” Crowley repeated, wondering if he’d ever make an original contribution to this conversation. “I’m…not sure if I remember you from the departmental information.”

“Oh—yes, of course, apologies. My surname is Fell, but nobody bothers with it. One doesn’t really need it, with a first name like Aziraphale.”

“Right,” said Crowley, vaguely remembering an A. Z. Fell from the faculty listing on the website (whom he _might_ have dismissed with an impatient “sounds like he hasn’t read anything newer than Shakespeare”). “Are you…moving?” he asked now, staring at the piles of books hemming Aziraphale in.

Aziraphale chuckled. “I certainly hope not. No, I…well, I thought I’d lost something.”

“I can’t imagine how,” said Crowley dryly, his gaze traveling around the thickly-packed shelves.

Aziraphale pursed his lips, and Crowley wondered if he’d already managed to offend him. He wasn’t even _trying_ to, yet.

“I _do_ know where everything is,” Aziraphale said primly. “And in any case, it wasn’t a book; it was my sword.”

“Your _sword_?” Crowley echoed, mentally reeling at the image of this waistcoated, bowtied, round-bellied man wielding a broadsword, like an Edwardian time traveler who’d gotten stuck in a medieval knights’ tournament.

“It’s not an actual sword,” Aziraphale said, a bit huffily. So Crowley _was_ managing to offend him. Fine; he might as well get on with it. “Mac gives them to us—oh, sorry, that’s Dr. MacDormand—she’s the dean of the College of Humanities—in any case, when one achieves tenure, she has these lovely little—well, I suppose they’re letter openers, but done in the shape of a sword. They’re meant to be displayed on one’s desk”—he gestured at his desk, which had no room to display a sword of any size—“as a…a mark of the achievement, I suppose. It’s a tradition.” He sighed fretfully. “I just completed the tenure process in July, and Mac will be stopping by next week, and she’ll expect to see it displayed.”

“Wait,” Crowley said, just on the edge of mocking, “you just got tenure in July? This is August. You’ve lost your commemorative sword, gifted to you by the dean herself, _already_?”

“I didn’t—” Aziraphale wasn’t meeting his eyes. “Igaveitaway.”

“You _what_?” Crowley was momentarily derailed from his plan of preemptively annoying his new colleague; he could feel an incredulously delighted smile sliding across his face.

“I gave it away!” Aziraphale said, wringing his hands. “Tracy’s little niece—ah, have you met Tracy? Department secretary?—it was her little niece Eve—she’s been struggling with reading, and she’s taking a summer course, and she was working on a book report—well, in any case, it was perfect for the little display she was making, and—well, I _was_ hoping that perhaps she or Tracy had brought it back when I wasn’t around and it had simply fallen behind something, but…well.” He took in a breath and visibly tried to set his round shoulders more firmly. “Ah—I do apologize, I’m being terribly rude. I’m sure you must have stopped by for a reason. Can I help you with anything?”

Crowley was sufficiently overwhelmed that he accidentally answered honestly. “Not really. I just thought I should meet anyone who’s available before things really get started next week.”

“That’s admirable,” Aziraphale said warmly, his smile returning, brightly enough that Crowley could forget there was a thunderstorm lashing the windows.

“Admirable” was an adjective that had definitely never been applied to Crowley.

He didn’t react well.

“Did you just use ‘admirable’ in actual conversation?” Even he was startled at how scathing his voice sounded.

The smile dimmed like the sun going behind a cloud.

Crowley wanted it back.

So, naturally, he took steps to be sure he wouldn’t get it back.

“Actually, I lied,” he continued brusquely. “I wasn’t trying to meet anyone. I was just looking for an office with a window so I could see how bad the rain is.” He nodded toward the rain-streaked window behind Aziraphale. “Gotta get across campus for some damned useless orientation meeting.”

His rudeness was deliberately calculated so that this stuffy fellow would send him on his way, but instead Aziraphale’s face softened sympathetically. “Oh, those _are_ dreadful,” he said. “Do take my umbrella; it’s right there by the door. At least that way you won’t be drenched _and_ bored to tears.”

Crowley looked automatically where he pointed and saw, sure enough, a white umbrella (white? Where in the Hell would you buy a white umbrella?) in an actual umbrella stand.

“Uh,” he said, “won’t you need it?” Unless the man was planning to spend the night in his office. As a child, Crowley had believed his teachers lived at school; Aziraphale seemed likely to actually do so.

“Oh, I should be fine—this rain will be ending in about an hour, and that’s when I’ll toddle on home.”

“What, are you some kind of weather wizard?” Crowley asked, equally startled by the confidence of the prediction and by the use of the word “toddle” in real life.

Aziraphale smiled again, not quite the beaming one, a more self-deprecating version. “Hardly a wizard, just an enthusiast,” he explained, gesturing toward his aging computer monitor. Crowley edged around the desk just far enough to see the screen, which was displaying three different kinds of weather maps and something that appeared to be a meteorologists’ chat room. “I tend to be a bit obsessive,” Aziraphale added, sounding faintly apologetic. “It’s something of a…persistent personality trait.”

“Nothing wrong with that,” said Crowley, thinking of his own extensive collection of Queen memorabilia. “Ah, fuck”—he’d glanced at his smartwatch—“I have to go, or I’ll be late to this dumbass meeting. Uh—the umbrella. I’ll just…bring it back. Later. Tomorrow.” Tomorrow was Saturday. “Soon as I can.”

He grabbed the ludicrous umbrella and made his escape, ears flaming and cheeks flushing. _That went down like a lead balloon_ , he thought, opening the umbrella (it shielded him from the wind-driven downpour shockingly well). He’d expected to either make a friend (although that would have been a fairly unprecedented move for him) or make an…adversary (which would have been much more in character), but instead, he’d mainly made an ass of himself.

It was fine—probably just some sort of social anxiety related to adapting to a new workplace. (Again.) He’d get over it soon enough. Or, more likely, sufficiently annoy Aziraphale into avoiding him. Crowley had a very successful history of annoying people.

* * *

Aziraphale blinked at his suddenly empty doorway, and then found himself turning toward the window to watch his own umbrella bobbing away, a bright white circle in the dull grey deluge.

“Well, that went down like a lead balloon,” he said softly.

It wasn’t as though he’d expected to _like_ the new faculty member. Departmental politics dictated that they were supposed to be adversaries, and Anthony Crowley’s area of expertise—something very modern and technology-based—ensured that they’d have nothing in common.

But he hadn’t expected to make an utter ass of himself.

He _should_ have presented as an established expert—tenured, he reminded himself—with extensive literary knowledge well beyond Dr. Crowley’s limited modern tastes.

Instead, he’d shown himself to be a disorganized, absent-minded, irresponsible, weather-obsessed…fusspot.

Ah, well. He sighed. That was the more accurate version anyway. Crowley would have discovered it soon enough. And Aziraphale doubted that it mattered anyway—Crowley’s CV, despite his impressive (and incomprehensibly modern) publication record, showed a history of someone who didn’t stay in one position for long. Had he been forced out of some of his previous universities? Or perhaps he was simply the sort to grow bored quickly. Based on the few moments he’d had with him, Aziraphale thought that the fellow _did_ seem to be that type—quick-moving, quick-witted, impatient, attractive—

That brought him up short.

Attractive?

What did that have to do with anything?

Of course, Crowley ( _Dr_. Crowley) _was_ attractive, in a…slick…sort of way. There was no point in denying that. The red hair (coiffed in that ruffled sort of way that was meant to look careless but probably wasn’t), the sharply-angled face, the lean but well-muscled arms (casually displayed via the close-fitting black t-shirt), the absurdly tight-fitting black jeans, the black sunglasses (sunglasses? Indoors?), the snake tattoo just below his temple—

Aziraphale took a breath and realized he’d been staring blankly out the window into the rain for some minutes. He turned around and looked, a bit glumly, at the dusty, disarrayed books he had to put back into some semblance of order, thanks to his fruitless sword search.

Best get to it, and stop his mind from wandering around the relative attractiveness of his newest colleague. Dr. Crowley would no doubt be an interesting study from a distance, he thought as he sorted through several volumes of criticism on the _Iliad_ —modern, a breath of fresh air for the department, probably a bit of a disruptive influence.

Exactly the kind of person who wouldn’t give Aziraphale a second thought.


	2. Pointy Sticks and Guillotines

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Taking your destined rival out to lunch. As one does.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just for clarification, Crowley and Aziraphale tend to refer to themselves as "English professors" as a convenient shorthand, because that's what it was called when they were growing up, and nobody (even Aziraphale) is going to go around calling themselves a "Literature and Language Arts professor" in casual conversation. This is confusing because Aziraphale's literary field isn't even written in English, but academia is nothing if not confusing.

Crowley couldn’t keep his thoughts from wandering back to Aziraphale.

Not that he would ever have paid attention to the orientation presentation, of course. But being distracted by something this specific—well, some _one_ this specific—that was new.

 _Welcome to Tadfield University_ , his brain replayed, with a helpful visual of that unreasonably bright smile.

 _That’s admirable_ , with the smile glowing such that Crowley could swear he actually felt physically warmer.

 _Do take my umbrella_ —who handed off their umbrella to someone they’d just met? Especially someone like Crowley?

_I gave it away!_

What the _Hell_.

How the _Hell_ could he explain Aziraphale—the living, breathing incarnation of the “stodgy professor” archetype—donating his tenure-commemorating gift from the dean to a child’s summer book report?

He couldn’t, and his brain had this _thing_ it did when he couldn’t explain something, which was to circle around the thing, poking it with pointy sticks, until the sticks turned into questions that would eventually get him into trouble.

His brain circled around Aziraphale all weekend.

Even if he hadn’t been filled with pointy-stick-inducing confusion, he would have been reminded of him anyway, each time he saw the borrowed white umbrella sitting by his door. Just as predicted, the rain had stopped before the unmemorable orientation meeting had ended, and by the time Crowley had returned to the department, Aziraphale had vanished, the only marks of his presence a pleasant lingering hint of cologne and a handwritten sign on his door detailing very confusing office hours.

So he kept the umbrella all weekend, feeling oddly responsible for it, though he did give it sharp looks every now and then, lest its fussiness infect the sterility he was establishing in his new house. And he brought it back to campus on Monday, hoping nobody saw him with it. Your forties were supposed to be when you stopped giving a fuck about things like that, but its inappropriateness for his Look was…extreme. (It didn’t _actually_ have ruffles, but it strongly gave that impression.)

But when he sauntered down the hall to Aziraphale’s office to see if he’d arrived, he stopped short when he heard the already-unmistakable tones of the dean of the College of Humanities.

“Where is the sword I gave you, Aziraphale?” Mac’s voice was somehow both mild and demanding at once.

“Oh—ah—yes—letter-opening…tenure…thing,” he heard Aziraphale say, nervousness oozing through the doorway and out into the hall. “It—it must be around here somewhere—I just set it down over…well…ah…” He trailed off. “Lose my own head next, I suppose.”

Crowley didn’t hear what else was said, because Mac’s heels clicked closer to the door, and he ducked back into his own office to avoid having to speak to her himself, shutting the door like the coward he was. He hadn’t exactly had good experiences with deans.

He stayed hidden for an hour before trying to return the umbrella again, but Aziraphale wasn’t there, or at least his door was closed. Crowley wondered if Mac might have eaten him for brunch. Crowley was not at all socially courageous enough to attempt something wild like _knocking on the door_ , so he retreated, again, to his own office and his sound system installation.

He was on his back fastening wiring under his desk, his legs splayed out in a very undignified way across the floor, when a fussy voice came tentatively from his doorway:

“Ah—hello?”

Crowley automatically tried to sit up—

“Ah fuck!”

He’d cracked the crown of his head on the underside of his desk, because of course he had.

“Oh, my dear, I’m terribly sorry!” A pair of khaki-clad knees knelt swiftly beside him; a soft hand reached for his elbow. “Are you alright?” The voice was genuinely concerned.

“Ngk,” said Crowley, groping for his sunglasses and putting them on before inchworming himself out from under his desk. His eyes were watering from the knock on his head, and he might have just hallucinated someone calling him “my dear.”

He emerged with his eyes appropriately shielded, frowning up into the worried, guilt-stricken face of Aziraphale, the overhead lighting in his hair giving him the appearance of wearing a halo.

Not the resident ghost, then—the resident angel.

(His only excuse for this absurdity, he concluded later, was that he _had_ just sustained a head injury.)

“Umbrella,” he said, astutely.

The worried guilt dancing across Aziraphale’s face was joined by confusion. “I beg your pardon?”

“Y’r umbrella. ‘S over there. Been trying to give it back.”

“Oh!” Aziraphale glanced where Crowley was pointing. “Oh, thank you, my dear.” (Apparently the “my dear” hadn’t been a hallucination, Crowley noted.)

“Shut up,” he grumbled aloud (the sudden gratitude beaming from Aziraphale’s face was overwhelming). “You’re the one who lent it to me.”

“Don’t mention it,” said Aziraphale, back to distractedly scanning him for injuries. “Are you hurt badly? Do you need ice? Should we take you to a hospital?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Crowley, struggling into a sitting position. “Only thing wrong with me is embarrassment.”

“Oh, but you shouldn’t be embarrassed at all,” Aziraphale said, and how the Hell could anyone manage to look that sincere? “It was entirely my fault; I shouldn’t have startled you.”

Crowley frowned at him, feeling as though he needed more than his sunglasses to shield him from the glow of kind concern Aziraphale was giving off.

It also occurred to him that they were two middle-aged men sitting on the floor. “We’re sitting on the floor,” he pointed out.

“Yes, I suppose we are,” Aziraphale agreed. “Would you like to relocate?”

“Yep,” Crowley grunted, reaching up to grab the edge of his desk and lever himself disorganizedly upward. Aziraphale, on the other hand, rose to a standing position as composedly as if he’d never left it.

“Oh dear, you’re quite dusty,” he tutted. “Here, let me—” And he pulled out an honest-to-goodness handkerchief and began dusting Crowley down with it.

“Ack!” Crowley spluttered, trying to fend off the assaultive piece of linen. “Eck—stop it!”

Aziraphale stopped immediately. “I do apologize. I’m afraid I’m a bit of a mother hen.” He took a step back, holding the handkerchief between his hands, now clasped neatly in front of his waistcoat. His eyes tracked streaks of dust across Crowley’s shoulders, not quite judgmentally but very close.

Crowley sighed resentfully. “Oh, go ahead.”

“Thank you, my dear,” Aziraphale beamed. The handkerchief raised goose bumps across Crowley’s neck and shoulders—actual fucking goose bumps—as it brushed across his thin black T-shirt. “There you are.”

“Am I presentable now?” Crowley asked, shoving his hands in his pockets (well, shoving his fingers, since that’s all that would fit).

Aziraphale’s eyes traveled up and down Crowley’s body in a suddenly…appraising…way. Crowley experienced an entirely new set of goose bumps.

“Quite presentable, yes.” Aziraphale folded his hands again, returning firmly to the stodgy professor.

“Uh,” said Crowley—he thought he might actually be _blushing_ —“did you come by just for your umbrella?”

“Oh!” Aziraphale touched his palm to his forehead. “Silly me. I was…in fact, I was wondering if you’d eaten lunch yet. Since you’re new in town, I hoped I might show you some of the available options…?”

The back of Crowley’s mind pointed out that his strategy of preemptively annoying Aziraphale into leaving him alone was failing spectacularly.

The front of his mind asked aloud, brilliantly, “Is it lunchtime already?” (The back noted, snidely, that there was a clock immediately above Aziraphale’s head where Crowley could easily determine this on his own. A clock Crowley had put there himself).

“A bit past, really.” Aziraphale said regretfully. “I’ve had rather a trying morning, I suppose.”

Crowley was diverted from the insult-comic tennis match occurring in his brain by the memory of the dean’s voice coolly flowing from Aziraphale’s office. He grinned. “Giving away your tenure sword? How’s that working out for you?”

Aziraphale fidgeted. “I do hope she doesn’t mention it again.” He gave a huffy little sigh and made an obvious effort to leave the subject behind. “Do let me take you to lunch; I’ve just nearly given you concussion, and I’ll feel horribly guilty if I don’t make it up somehow.”

“You didn’t—” Crowley started, but gave it up after a glance at the fragile hope in Aziraphale’s eyes. “Oh, fine. What did you have in mind?”

Aziraphale’s smile lit up the office in a way that _definitely_ clashed with Crowley’s aesthetic. “How do you feel about crepes?”

* * *

Aziraphale had not, of course, been thinking of Crowley throughout the weekend. Only occasionally, in the way that one might think of a new colleague. And it was only natural that he’d been reminded of him when he indulged his weather obsession (“ _Nothing wrong with that,_ ” Crowley had said), and when he looked for his spare umbrella. And when he remembered Mac and the lost tenure sword. And when he thought of people with surnames.

Inviting him to lunch was simply a gesture of kindness that anyone might extend to someone new in town. They couldn’t be _friends_ —they were on opposite sides of the invisible but insurmountable departmental divide between literature and language arts—but there was no need to be rude. And it wasn’t as though anyone else from the department was around for lunch. Aziraphale didn’t mind eating alone, but…well, conversations with the dean frequently had the effect of prompting him to seek out company. Even company as…disconcerting…as Crowley seemed to be.

“How are you _wearing_ that?” Crowley demanded, as they pushed through their building’s creaking, very solid wooden door into the pounding heat (the storm from Friday was gone as if it had never been there, and they were in for two weeks of oppressively humid sun, according to most models). “It’s August. In Tennessee. And you’re buttoned up in…what, at least three layers?” Crowley was eyeing Aziraphale’s bow tie and waistcoat critically.

“I did leave the jacket indoors,” Aziraphale defended himself. “Besides, you’re one to talk, wearing all black in the heat.” Unfortunately, that was a bit of a tactical error, as it drew his eyes back to Crowley’s decidedly distracting form, very visibly displayed in another close-fitting T-shirt (black) and jeans (also black, and also—extremely—close fitting). “Do you _own_ any clothing that isn’t black?”

Crowley’s shapely eyebrows arched over his sunglasses, and Aziraphale worried he might have offended him, but instead Crowley’s mouth twitched into a half-smile that might have been…appreciative. “Some red,” he conceded. “And some very very dark grey.”

He took Crowley to one of his favorite restaurants—admittedly, “Aziraphale’s favorite restaurants” was a rather long list, but this one was in the top five or so—

“It’s called the _what_?” Crowley snorted.

“Ah, well, The Bastille,” Aziraphale said, faintly apologetically.

“Do they _know_ what the Bastille was for?” demanded Crowley.

“Oh yes, definitely,” Aziraphale sighed. “They—well, you’ll see. The crepes are truly scrumptious, though.”

The Bastille Creperie occupied a corner of what had once been a mansion, built at the unfortunate height of Tadfield’s Gothic architecture obsession. Unlike the University campus, where the sandstone turrets and spires generally achieved elegance rather than pretentiousness, the Bastille mansion, well…

“Scrumptious,” Crowley echoed, and probably would have said something scathing about Aziraphale’s word choice if he hadn’t been halted in his tracks by the mass of towers and arches and buttresses ahead of them. “Huh.” He gazed a bit longer. “Is there a dungeon?”

“It’s a wine bar these days.”

One of those really excessively mobile eyebrows shot up again. “A wine bar. In the Bastille. Has anyone thought to write ‘BLOOD’ on the wall?”

“Ah—not directly on the wall,” admitted Aziraphale. “It’s framed behind the—wait, you’ve read _A Tale of Two Cities_?” He’d gotten the impression that Crowley wasn’t interested in anything published more than a decade ago.

“I’m an English professor; of course I’ve read _A Tale of Two Cities_ ,” Crowley snapped. “Tolerable, for Dickens. I prefer the funny ones, though. Is there an old woman knitting anywhere that I should avoid?”

“Well, not an _old_ woman,” Aziraphale started—

Crowley spluttered.

“Oh, hush. The owners are a very nice couple, Carmine and Agnes, and if you make a donation to the local childhood reading foundation, Agnes will knit your name into a wall hanging.”

Crowley mouthed soundlessly a couple of times, then smirked. “I suppose your name is the first one on there.”

“Of course not,” Aziraphale scoffed. “I’ve only lived here three years. I’m the 999th.” He looked to the side. “I _am_ the first English professor, though.”

Aziraphale eventually managed to drag Crowley actually _inside_ the restaurant, where he immediately insisted on locating Aziraphale’s name within the yards of colorfully knitted (flame-resistant) fabric that were gradually overtaking the white-plastered walls.

“Look at that, you’re famous!” Crowley said, grinning in a way that was either irritating or infectious. “Or you’re marked for death, one. Wait—is that a guillotine?”

“It’s for bagels,” Aziraphale sighed, firmly guiding Crowley to a table.

“So you’ve only lived here three years,” Crowley said once they’d given their order to Mrs. Agnes (who was waiting tables herself today, as the Bastille’s usual small army of undergraduates wouldn’t be arriving for the Fall semester for a few more days). “Where were you before that?”

Crowley was regarding Aziraphale from behind his sunglasses in an intense way that should have made Aziraphale nervous. Aziraphale should have been on his guard around Crowley anyway, he reminded himself. Departmentally speaking, Crowley was the Enemy. Aziraphale _should_ be nervous.

He really should be.

“Oh—it’s a smaller university, in Kentucky,” he answered. “Religiously affiliated, you know. Eastgate. Not many people have heard of it, really.”

Crowley’s jaw had dropped. “Nnngg—you were at Eastgate? You’re joking—I’ve literally never met anyone else who was at Eastgate. I did my first year of undergrad there.”

“Oh my goodness,” said Aziraphale, who had also never met anyone who had been at Eastgate, and would _certainly_ not have expected it to be Crowley. “I was there for…well, quite a bit longer than that. We must have overlapped.”

They determined, after some chronological wrangling, that Crowley’s freshman year had coincided with Aziraphale’s junior year, and that they must have very nearly met, since—

“You were in choir too?” Crowley echoed. “Nahhhh—I mean, we couldn’t have been in the same one. I’d remember you.”

“Oh, I—I doubt it,” Aziraphale shrugged this off in confusion. “I’m hardly memorable. Ah—which choir were you in?”

“Show choir,” said Crowley, with a touch of embarrassment. It looked unexpectedly nice on him. “It was the ‘90s, y’know?”

“I suppose so,” said Aziraphale. “That explains why we didn’t meet, though. Show choir was a bit too…showy…for me. I was in A Capella.”

“Really?” Crowley replied. Did he look faintly impressed? It was hard to tell, with the sunglasses. “You must be good; the AC was the best.”

“We certainly thought we were,” Aziraphale said, smiling in spite of…in spite of something. “Do you remember—oh. Thank you, my dear.” This last was directed at Mrs. Agnes, who briskly set their plates of crepes before them, her ample skirts swishing swishily (she was dressed, as usual, as though she might at any moment tell your fortune or lecture you about eating more fiber). The interruption gave Aziraphale time to remember that he did _not_ want to go into particulars about his time at Eastgate. Especially not his departure from Eastgate, and especially not with someone who—again—was an adversary, not a friend, and who could by no means be trusted. And who was looking at him now with that gleamingly mischievous grin. That grin was most definitely irritating. Definitely.

“Waaaiiit,” Crowley said through the grin, brandishing a strawberry-filled crepe at Aziraphale. “Eastgate—thingy—mascot. The Eastgate Angels. You were an Eastgate _Angel_.”

“Yes?” Aziraphale frowned at him, picking up a fallen strawberry slice and depositing it safely on a plate.

“It’s just”—the crepe traveled alarmingly close to Aziraphale’s sweet tea—“when I met you the other day, I thought for a second—errghhh—that maybe you were the department ghost—I mean everything was deserted and you…uuehhh…sort of rose up out of stacks of books, and—and then, um…yeah.” Crowley took a bite of his crepe and chewed far more vigorously than it needed. “Anyway. Ghost. Angel.”

Aziraphale considered being insulted at being mistaken for a ghost, but—well, at least it was original. On the other hand—“But a ghost and an angel aren’t the same thing at all,” he objected. “Theologically speaking, an angel is an entirely different created being from a human, while a ghost is merely a…a remnant of a human soul.”

“Whatever, angel,” said Crowley, slouching back in his chair insolently. “Besides, isn’t there a passage in…”

An hour or so later, the crepes were gone (mostly due to Aziraphale; Crowley had an appallingly small appetite), and Crowley and Aziraphale’s discussion had veered from angels to Dante to Baptist denominations to squirrels and had ended up at modern adaptations of Shakespearean comedies. Aziraphale knew he should return to campus; he was still putting the final touches on his syllabus for Greek Poetic Forms. But he was remarkably comfortable here, in this colorfully cozy little restaurant where the owners knew him, full of mingled savory and sweet cooking scents, with the sizzling of crepes and whirring of the coffee-making apparatus and the snick-thud of the bagel guillotine surrounding him as he debated the finer points of As You Like It with…with his new adversary.

Well, the semester hadn’t started. Technically, Crowley wasn’t his adversary _yet_.


	3. Literature and Language Arts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Oh,” said Crowley, startled at the pang that shot through him. “You mean we’re on opposite sides.”
> 
> “More than that, actually,” Aziraphale said, with a certain…reticence. “There’s an…unofficial practice to…ah…maintain equilibrium. The two sides alternate when hiring new faculty. After the Literature side brought me in, it was the Language Arts side’s turn.”
> 
> “And they hired me,” Crowley said slowly. “So, I’m your…uuhhh….”
> 
> “Counterpart, perhaps. Or…rival.” Aziraphale looked away, fidgeting.
> 
> “Huh,” said Crowley, adjusting his sunglasses. “I’ve never had a rival before, really.”
> 
> “Nor have I,” replied Aziraphale, his brow furrowing (cutely, Crowley’s brain informed him unhelpfully). “I’m not sure of the…ah…proper protocol.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you've noticed that Aziraphale's time-to-tenure (3 years) is oddly short, there's a reason for that! It will be explained.
> 
> Content warning: Gabriel is a clueless gaslighter who briefly body-shames Aziraphale in this chapter (though he gets shut down immediately). 
> 
> Aziraphale himself is comfortable with his body by this point in his life.

Crowley rearranged his limbs across his chair as Ms. Carmine glided between him and Aziraphale to take their plates. She was dressed, he noted, as though she might at any moment seduce you or start a transcontinental war. Or both at once, probably.

“Thank you, my dear,” Aziraphale twinkled at her. Crowley waited for her to pull out a sword and smite him with it, but all she did was give him a chin-toss of a nod before gliding away, glidingly. This, Crowley thought, went a long way in explaining why his usual Plan A of Social Interactions (“annoy them until they leave you alone and save you the trouble”) wasn’t working. If Aziraphale was the type to “my dear” someone who looked like she’d murder you as soon as she’d make you a crepe, it was no wonder that Crowley’s style of small-scale nuisances weren’t making a dent. Although, really, he felt like he’d pulled out a number of stops. He’d criticized Aziraphale’s taste in literature; he’d mocked his dress sense; he’d even given him an irritating nickname, for God’s sake—and the only result had been a very extended lunch break.

Crowley would either have to escalate Plan A or move on to Plan B.

Except that he wasn’t sure what Plan B actually _was_.

They did eventually leave the little restaurant, Aziraphale with a regretful sigh that Crowley assumed had more to do with his love for crepes (or reluctance to work on the minutiae of syllabi) than with any enjoyment of Crowley’s company. The August heat gripped and held like a jealous lover, an area where Crowley had some experience. Speaking of which—

“What’s the story behind the two department chairs?” (Pointy sticks. Poke poke poke. Always.)

“ _Oh_ ,” said Aziraphale with a particularly extravagant eye roll. The expressiveness of that round face was unfair. “I’d have thought someone would have explained it to you by now, though of course we try not to talk about it publically. It’s dreadfully _political_.” (Crowley wouldn’t have been remotely surprised if he’d pulled out a lace fan and begun fluttering it at his face.) “It all dates from before I arrived here, of course. Tadfield University…ah… _acquired_ …a smaller school—it was one of those standalone, private institutions, if you know the sort.”

“The predatory kind, you mean?” Crowley frowned.

“Well. Most likely, I’m afraid, although I’m sure it began with good intentions. It was called Higher Education and Leveled Learning, and it experienced some…rather substantial financial difficulties in the late Nineties and then the Twenty-aughts.”

Crowley guessed that he meant embezzlement, but he was much too amused by Aziraphale’s euphemisms, and the way his eyes widened when he used them, to ruin it by asking for clarification. (Also… _Twenty-aughts_?)

“In any case, Tadfield took it over in 2010 or so, and I imagine by then that the owners were relieved to be rid of it. It’s been a bit of a…trial, merging all the departments that were, well, redundant.”

“Ohhh,” Crowley said. “So we’re called the Department of Literature and Language Arts because we’re literally two different departments shoved together? I figured it was just because someone was wordy.”

“Ah, well, that wouldn’t be surprising,” said Aziraphale, pulling the massive, creaking door open as they reached their building. “After you, my dear”—cool air swept over them as they stepped into the stairwell—“but in fact it was part of Mac’s plan to bring us together. Tadfield had the Department for the Study of Literature, while the private school had the Language Arts Department. Similar, but with slightly different emphases, of course. Mac created the dual department chairs so that each…ah…side…would feel appropriately represented, while the department as a whole functions as one.”

His lips were pressed together in a politely judgmental way that prompted Crowley to query: “And… _does_ it function as one?”

“Well,” Aziraphale replied, in a way that answered the question thoroughly. He glanced around nervously as they reached the second floor, ushered Crowley into his cluttered office, and shut the door. “That was the plan. Is the plan. And it’s an admir—a commendable plan, of course. But in practice, there’s…what you might describe as a sense of tension between the two sides.”

Crowley surmised that “a sense of tension” most likely meant “a few steps away from open war.”

“Sooooheurrgh,” he said, flopping into a chair after Aziraphale removed a stack of books, “the chair I report to is B. Is that short for anything, by the way?”

“Oh, no; that’s their name—just B. They’re the chair for Language Arts. And Gabriel’s my chair—Literature.”

“Oh,” said Crowley, startled at the pang that shot through him. “You mean we’re on opposite sides.”

“More than that, actually,” Aziraphale said, with a certain…reticence. “There’s an…unofficial practice to…ah…maintain equilibrium. The two sides alternate when hiring new faculty. After the Literature side brought me in, it was the Language Arts side’s turn.”

“And they hired me,” Crowley said slowly. “So, I’m your…uuhhh….”

“Counterpart, perhaps. Or…rival.” Aziraphale looked away, fidgeting.

“Huh,” said Crowley, adjusting his sunglasses. “I’ve never had a rival before, really.”

“Nor have I,” replied Aziraphale, his brow furrowing (cutely, Crowley’s brain informed him unhelpfully). “I’m not sure of the…ah…proper protocol.”

“We could just, y’know, forget about it,” Crowley suggested, stupidly, because hadn’t he just spent the last two hours doing his best to avoid the chance that he might form a…a friendship, or whatever? Plan A, preemptive annoyance, all of that? “I mean, just because they want us to be rivals doesn’t mean we have to be.”

Aziraphale’s eyes flew to Crowley’s with something in them that might— _might_ —have been hope, but it was overtaken too quickly by anxiety for Crowley to read it. “Oh—oh no,” Aziraphale said. “I—I—I’m afraid my side would never permit that. Nor would yours. You certainly don’t want to cross B. That’s much too risky.”

Crowley raised an eyebrow. “I can decide for myself what’s _too risky_ or not.”

Aziraphale flinched. “I only meant—you only just got here. You mustn’t go antagonizing your chair already.”

“Sure,” said Crowley, hating himself. “Well, I guess I’ll see you when the semester starts, _rival_.” And he left, though not fast enough to avoid the sight of hurt spreading across Aziraphale’s open face.

Right. _That_ was Plan B. Leave them before they can leave you.

~~~~~

Aziraphale lost track of how many times he reminded himself that there was no need to be distressed in any way over his last conversation with Crowley. They weren’t friends, and couldn’t be. They were rivals, and it was for the best to have that established from the beginning. In fact, he should have established it from the _very_ beginning—and would have, if he’d realized Crowley hadn’t been aware.

None of this explained why, the Friday before the start of the semester, he was making his way to Crowley’s office a quarter of an hour before their first faculty meeting.

“Ah—hello,” he said once Crowley had opened the door, attempting (unsuccessfully) to readjust to the sight of his colleague— _rival_ —up close in his tight-fitting black.

“Hi,” said Crowley, flatly, his face unreadable through the sunglasses. “How can I help you?”

“Oh—ah”— _of course_ Arizaphale was flustered. How irritating. “I—I was just thinking that, since you hadn’t been to a faculty meeting yet, you might not know…where to go. Or what to expect.”

It was a thoroughly flimsy excuse, given that the room number and an agenda had been included in a departmental email just this morning, but it was all he had. Crowley’s mouth twisted, but—

“Fine, come in,” he sighed, stepping back. “If that’s something _your side_ would permit.”

Aziraphale rolled his eyes at that, but was distracted by his first real sight of Crowley’s office, since his previous visit had been taken up by his concern over Crowley’s head injury (certainly not by any interest in the length of Crowley’s legs, no matter what images his brain kept supplying). “Oh my,” he said. “You’ve gotten quite a lot done.”

“Oh,” said Crowley, glancing around as if he’d forgotten about it, “Mmmyeah, guess so.”

Despite its base material being the same stock of ancient, bulky, university-supplied furniture as in Aziraphale’s office, it would have been hard to imagine a greater contrast in style. There were almost no books, to start with, which seemed odd for an English professor, but Aziraphale supposed Crowley used some sort of modern electronic media for reading. Instead, the shelves housed displays of musical albums placed at precise intervals, audio equipment that Aziraphale didn’t comprehend, and potted plants that looked alarmingly healthy.

“It’s very…modern,” he summarized.

“You don’t like it,” Crowley smirked.

“No, I didn’t say that,” Aziraphale replied hastily. “It—it suits you.” Which was true; it somehow had the same aesthetic as Crowley himself—long, clean lines, a certain lean minimalism, and—oh _dear_ ; he mustn’t get diverted again by Crowley’s…aesthetics.

“It’s supposed to, yeah,” Crowley was saying. “Nnnhh—what were you going to say about the meeting? I’ve been to plenty of faculty meetings, y’know. Could make my own faculty meeting BINGO cards at this point. Or drinking game, preferably.”

“Oh, I quite agree,” said Aziraphale, who’d mentally constructed BINGO cards in faculty meetings for years, but had never had anyone to share them with. “There are certain…consistencies…in our meetings here that are…ah…very noticeable. At least I’ve thought so.”

“Go on, then,” said Crowley, grinning in that way that Aziraphale really ought to find alarming. “What should I be looking for?”

“Ah,” said Aziraphale, glancing automatically at the closed door. “Well. Dagon will express her displeasure at everyone being behind on paperwork.” He really shouldn’t be sharing his thoughts about other colleagues with Crowley, but that one was certainly safe—Dagon herself would wholeheartedly agree with him. Well, whole- _something_ -ly. Dagon likely had a filing system in place of a heart. “And…Hastur will say something bizarre, and Ligur will add something even more bizarre.” That was a little more risky, but there was a good chance Hastur and Ligur would take it as a compliment if it ever got back to them. “Gabriel will make a joke that insults someone, and only Sandy will laugh.” Oh dear; speaking about his own chair in that way was terribly risky. On the other hand, Crowley was unlikely to have much direct communication with Gabriel…so perhaps it was alright. “Sandy will say something he thinks is deeply insightful, and Gabriel will be impressed by it.” For Heaven's sake—this was really dreadfully unwise. “Oh—and B will threaten bodily harm to someone. And we _may_ manage to discuss departmental business somewhere along the way.”

They walked together to the meeting, because it was only courteous for Aziraphale to show a new colleague the way to the conference room, of course. They were the first to arrive, which was just as well, because Crowley followed Aziraphale as he made his way to his usual seat, obviously not realizing that—

“Oh, you’ll have to sit on the left-hand side of the room, my dear. That’s the Language Arts side.”

“Seriously?” Crowley demanded. “We have—aaacghhh—actual assigned sides of the room? What are we, seven years old?”

Aziraphale had met seven-year-olds with more mature social organization than the Department of Literature and Language Arts, but before he could say so, the other faculty began to arrive.

“Ah, Hastur, Ligur, this is Anthony Crowley; he’s—”

“We know who he is,” Hastur interrupted. “C’mon, Anthony; you’re on our side.” Both he and Ligur sent suspicious looks back at Aziraphale as they escorted Crowley away. Aziraphale suddenly felt oddly alone.

He didn’t have time to think about that in any detail, though, before their department chairs arrived. Gabriel breezed in just ahead of B, who sent a resentfully simmering glare at the back of Gabriel’s well-tailored jacket as they took their side-by-side matching seats at the head of the conference table.

“Welcome back!” Gabriel began heartily, sending his toothy smile around the room. “We have—”

“Excuse me,” Dagon interrupted, loudly and nasally as usual, from her seat on B’s other side.

Gabriel’s smile slipped a notch, but he hung it back up determinedly. “Yes, Dagon?”

“I still need start-of-semester paperwork from everyone except Michael,” she snapped—or, actually, said in her ordinary voice, which was permanently snappish. (Michael was too dignified to look smug, but she projected it anyway.) Dagon began listing the required forms, which were the same as they had been every semester, which never stopped her from listing them in detail. Crowley—who had somehow ended up seated directly across from Aziraphale—arched an eyebrow at him and made an imaginary checkmark, a corner of his mouth tilting upwards in a tiny suggestion of his familiar—no, _alarming_ —grin. Aziraphale pressed his own mouth into a firm line and definitely did not smile back.

“Uh, yes, thank you, Dagon. As usual. Everyone, be sure to get your paperwork submitted! Time is ticking!” Gabriel’s smile was still at full wattage, though it looked a bit fixed. “We have a full agenda—”

“First we’re introducing new faculty,” B interrupted from beside him. In contrast to Gabriel’s excessively tailored grey suit (the only non-neutral tone was his lavender tie), B wore a red knitted hat that looked hand-knitted (by someone who didn’t knit) and a loose shirt covered with large, disturbingly realistic images of flies. “Anthony Crowley,” they added. It sounded like an accusation.

“Yes,” admitted Crowley, who was sprawled across his chair in a way that had only a tenuous relationship to its shape. His sunglasses hid his expression, but Aziraphale thought he looked uncomfortable as everyone’s eyes turned to him. Well, he certainly sympathized with that.

“Of course!” said Gabriel, forcing his smile back into place yet again. “Our newest addition. Expert in…contemporary…” He waved a hand. “Tell us about yourself, Anthony.”

“Contemporary literary expression,” said Crowley in a frostily controlled tone that Aziraphale hadn’t yet heard from him, even when they’d discussed their…rivalry. “And I go by Crowley, thanks.”

“Haha, we’re strictly on a first-name basis in this department,” Gabriel said, cheerily. “It’ll be Anthony around here!”

“I really prefer Crowley,” said Crowley, all the visible parts of his face devoid of expression. He hadn’t abandoned his ostensibly relaxed position, but Aziraphale thought the long lines of his body nevertheless were radiating tension.

“No, no, we can’t treat you differently from everyone else, now can we?” Gabriel’s smile had grown even wider. Sandy, to his right, was nodding sanctimoniously. B, on the other hand, was swelling slightly in that way they did before a fight.

“Ah,” Aziraphale found himself speaking up, improbably, and tried not to cringe visibly as the gazes that had been fixed on Crowley and Gabriel shifted to him, “it’s possible that I’ve misunderstood the—ah—policy, but wouldn’t it be more accurate, strictly speaking, to say that we’re on a _preferred_ name basis? After all, Uri uses their middle name, as does Hastur, and technically Sandy uses a nickname. Wouldn’t using Dr. Crowley’s surname be equivalent to that, if it’s his preference?”

Gabriel’s face went flat and cold for a fraction of a second that sent an unpleasant shiver down Aziraphale’s spine, but then his smile switched back on. “Right!” he said, bringing his hands together. “Preferred name basis. Good compromise, Aziraphale,” he said, no longer looking at him. Crowley, on the other hand, _was_ looking at Aziraphale (or, at least, his sunglasses were angled in Aziraphale’s general direction). His expression was still carefully blank, but in a more thoughtful way now.

Gabriel and B moved along through the agenda, wresting the lead back and forth from each other in a game of tug-o-war that everyone had to pretend wasn’t happening. None of the other items were remotely interesting until they reached the final one:

“We have to decide who’s teaching the Apocalypse class in the Spring,” said B.

“Now, now, B,” Gabriel interjected, his smile hanging on by a thread by this point, “you know that’s not what it’s called. It’s the Literature and Language Skills course.”

“Whatever,” said B. “Someone still has to teach it.”

“Well,” said Gabriel, doggedly optimistic, “Uri and Hastur taught it last year…”

Uri’s gold-toned makeup lent an air of elegance to their expression of distaste. Hastur, who was probably allergic to elegance, curled his mouth in a sneer.

“I’d rather cut off my right arm than teach that again,” he snarled. Nobody laughed, since nobody could be sure that he wasn’t serious.

“Or somebody’s right arm,” Ligur growled beside him. The lack of laughter became more pronounced.

Crowley didn’t quite look at Aziraphale, but he lifted that distracting eyebrow again and made two imaginary checkmarks on his meeting agenda. It sidetracked Aziraphale sufficiently that he didn’t realize until too late that Gabriel was scanning the Literature side of the room like a rather desperate predatory animal—

“Aziraphale!”

“Ah—I beg your pardon?” Aziraphale tried to swallow an abrupt sense of dread.

“You haven’t taught the Apoc—the Literature and Language Skills course before!” Gabriel beamed, in the way that a particularly obtuse shark might before taking your head off by accident.

“Well, no, but I’m afraid I can’t this Spring, as I’m already scheduled to teach—”

“Don’t be silly; we’ll get you a course release for one of those,” Gabriel waved this aside. “And it’ll be great for your CV; after all, this course was Mac’s idea, and it can’t hurt to build up a little favor for yourself with the dean.” He winked, and before Aziraphale could marshal his next protest, had turned back to B—“That settles the Literature side! Now, who'll be joining Aziraphale from the Language Arts side?”

B’s hard eyes glanced down their side of the conference room. “Crowley,” they said. “Let the new guy have it.”

“Eeehhrrggh,” said Crowley, both eyebrows now launching upward.

“Don’t argue or I’ll strangle you,” B told him detachedly. Crowley didn’t argue. He _did_ give Aziraphale a helplessly confused look. Aziraphale gave a tiny shrug and mimed making a tiny checkmark.

“Perfect!” said Gabriel. “A new-faculty-member team-up. Excellent idea.”

“We couldn’t have planned it better,” said Sandy, “if we planned it.”

“Oh, that’s good!” Gabriel wagged his finger at Sandy enthusiastically. “We couldn’t have planned it better…if we planned it!”

Aziraphale tried not to cringe overtly, and took a morsel of comfort from Crowley making another imaginary checkmark.

The meeting was nearly done by then, though Aziraphale barely noticed the remaining items and only automatically joined the shuffle to leave, as he was anxiously sorting through what he’d have to rearrange, this semester and next, in order to prepare and teach the Apocalypse class. He’d really hoped to avoid that onerous duty permanently; his area of expertise wasn’t suited to it at all, and—

“Oh, Aziraphale!” Gabriel, with Sandy flanking him to his right as usual, called him back just when he’d nearly escaped. “I need to ask you about”—his eyes flicked to B and Crowley, the only others who hadn’t yet filtered out—“about restaurant ideas! For a group event. For the Literature faculty working lunch.”

Aziraphale had never heard of a Literature faculty working lunch. From the way B’s eyes narrowed, he guessed they never had either.

“I mean, you can tell Aziraphale likes restaurants!” Gabriel blustered on, smiling vigorously, and gesturing in a way that indicated Aziraphale’s waistline without technically pointing at it. Only Sandy laughed. Aziraphale took in a slow breath. B’s face took on an even more disgusted expression than usual. Crowley…Crowley _glowered_.

“Are you body shaming?” he demanded. Behind him, a slow smile traversed B’s face, which was never a good sign.

“Huh?” said Gabriel. “Oh—no, no, no, of course not! I just meant that Aziraphale’s an expert at…at choosing quality food.”

“Whatever, Gabe,” said B. “Body shaming’s pretty low, even for you.”

“I—no—I—” Gabriel was actually _flustered_ , something Aziraphale couldn’t remember seeing before. He steepled his fingers and imitated the idea of a calming breath. “I need to consult with Aziraphale about a Literature faculty event,” he said with forced dignity. “Can you excuse us, please?”

After they had left (B with an eye roll, Crowley with a frowning final look at Gabriel), Sandy closed the conference room door while Gabriel let out a gusty sigh. “Sorry about them,” he told Aziraphale. “If they had left quickly, I wouldn’t have needed that restaurant ruse.”

“Ah—ruse?” Aziraphale echoed. Besides feeling unaccountably trapped, with Sandy on one side and Gabriel on the other, his mind was still filled with Crowley’s blazing indignation on his behalf—well, presumably not on _Aziraphale’s_ behalf, specifically; he probably was just opposed to body shaming in general, but nonetheless—

“Of course it was a ruse,” Gabriel said with an overdone eye roll. Sandy nodded, grinning. “We don’t have a Literature faculty working lunch—can you imagine the scheduling nightmare? No, I just needed you to stay for a few moments so I can talk to you about the Apocalypse course. Since you haven’t taught it before, and you’re still new around here, really—tenured, of course! But you’re still our new guy, ha!—I need to fill you in on…the _backstory_.”

“I—I see,” said Aziraphale, who didn’t.

“Great,” said Gabriel. “Of course, it started before your time, but I’m sure you know that Mac specifically requested a few years ago that we create the Apoc—the Literature and Language Skills course.”

“To…encourage collaboration between the two sides of our department, yes,” said Aziraphale. “One faculty member from Literature and one from Language Arts, working together to teach a topic of their choice.”

“Very good!” Gabriel punched Aziraphale’s shoulder in a way that was no doubt meant to be friendly. “That’s the party line, word perfect. Of course, the reality is a little different.” Aziraphale’s attempted reply of “oh, it is?” was swallowed as Gabriel plowed on: “What we actually need you to do is make sure Anthony—or, _Crowley_ ”—he gave his scripted eye roll again—“ _fails_. The goal is to make sure the other side looks bad. Or, to say the same thing another way, you need to do whatever you can to make sure _our_ side comes out looking good.”

“Ah—oh,” said Aziraphale, looking back and forth between Gabriel and Sandy, who were both smiling expectantly, waiting for the penny to drop. “Sorry—let me just—ah—clarify. This—well, making sure the other side fails—it _appears_ to go against the spirit of what Mac has requested.”

Both Sandy and Gabriel laughed loudly and jovially. Aziraphale wasn’t sure if he should join in, and settled for smiling shakily.

“I love Mac, of course,” said Gabriel. “She’s a brilliant leader. Visionary. _But_ ”—he brought his fingertips together to indicate that he was being tactful—“she’s a little… _idealistic_. We know what she’s requested, of course, but what she _needs_ is a clear illustration of just how incompetent the Language Arts side truly is.”

“I see,” said Aziraphale, again. “And…in previous years…the Literature faculty members have all attempted to…ah…demonstrate this?”

“There you go; now you’re getting it!” Gabriel said. Sandy, next to him, was nodding like a small-headed windup toy. “And now it’s your turn. We’re all counting on you!”


	4. Conspiracies and Frogs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If you can't convince your adversary to avert the Apocalypse (class) with you...get him to take you to lunch.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warning: Homophobia gets discussed in this chapter, though no homophobic acts or statements occur (nor will they in this fic).
> 
> The LGBTQA identities of several characters are mentioned (respectfully).

Crowley had been ambushed.

He looked around for rescue, but the only person available was regarding him with an amused smirk on her creatively made-up face.

“Um…ayerrrr…yeah,” he said to his assailant, who was a young person with a hairstyle that probably took some effort, but unfortunately reminded Crowley of rabbit ears, especially as it bobbed up and down in front of him.

“Right!” said this person, who had Crowley trapped by the faculty mailboxes. “And that part, uh, where you said that selfies show the changing and the, uh, the repetition of the individual’s interests in the same way that the seasons change throughout the year but always revolve back, uh, to their starting point—that was really profound, y’know, and it made me think really hard about, uh—it made me think really hard.”

“That’s—that’s good,” Crowley managed, trying not to cringe. Had he really written that? “Uh—have we met?”

“Uh, no, not yet—I’m, uh, Eric—”

“Eric’s my undergraduate assistant this semester,” Tracy the department secretary interrupted, _finally_. “And I need you to post these by the elevators, sweetie,” she added to Eric, who nodded his rabbit-haired head but, unfortunately, didn’t leave.

“I really wanted to talk to you about the part where—”

“Tell you what,” Crowley interrupted. “Why don’t you come to my office hours once the semester starts, and we can pull the article up and talk about it that way?” He’d slammed out “Selfies: Navigating Personal Expression in Our Impersonally Hyperpersonal World” in an afternoon, five years ago, as a favor to a former student, and damned well didn’t remember anything specific about what he’d said. (And apparently didn’t want to, either.)

“Uh, sure, right, and I’m taking your Digital Humanities course, and I’m really excited about—”

“Shoo, honey,” Tracy sent him along. “Those announcements aren’t going to post themselves.”

Crowley steadied himself against a counter and gave Tracy a shell-shocked look that he hoped his sunglasses hid.

“He’s been a little excited to meet you, darling,” Tracy said, smiling sweetly with shockingly purple lips. Last week, she’d had blond hair and had looked like a Southern secretary who’d escaped from the 1980s. This week, her hair was red (not red like Crowley’s, more…neon), and she looked like she was on her way to conduct a very fraudulent séance.

“Nnnhhh,” said Crowley. “I gathered. Um…I was actually just trying to ask if you’d seen Aziraphale. I need to meet with him about the—unnrrr—Literacy and—the Apocalypse class. Can’t seem to get in touch with him.”

Tracy’s thickly-mascaraed eyes narrowed. “Now you listen, sweetie”—Crowley had never been called sweetie in such a threatening manner—“This year I don’t want any undergraduates crying in my office, or conspiracy theories about the Antichrist in the elevator, or escaped frogs hopping down the hallway. Do you understand?”

“Rrriiight,” said Crowley, who was backed up against the mailboxes again. “No Antichrists, no frogs.” He had assumed the Apocalypse nickname was metaphorical, but possibly he’d been wrong. “And I’ll…uhhh…try and keep the crying undergraduates to a minimum.” His history wasn’t exactly free of crying undergraduates, although as far as he knew, none of them had had to resort to a departmental secretary for comfort. “Does that mean you haven’t seen Aziraphale?”

It took him until Friday to track down Aziraphale. By then he’d emailed three times and (very bravely) knocked on his door twice—everything short of calling him on the phone, because what kind of maniac would do _that_ —and, having heard nothing, resorted to reconnaissance. His first idea was to waylay Aziraphale on his way into the building in the morning, but Aziraphale apparently arrived to work at what Crowley considered an unacceptably early time. Rather than give up his well-earned morning sloth, he engaged in a spot of lurking (he’d perfected the art of lurking decades ago) and spotted Aziraphale as he hurried out for lunch.

“Hey, angel,” he said, some minutes later, definitely not short of breath (it had taken a surprising amount of time and speed to catch up with Aziraphale).

“Oh,” said Aziraphale, eyes darting to Crowley nervously. “Ah. Hello.”

“So, we’re teaching a course together next semester,” Crowley prompted.

Aziraphale sped up, which shouldn’t have been possible. “I’m afraid I don’t have time to discuss it at present,” he said.

“Well, we have to talk about it eventually.” Crowley cut across neatly-trimmed grass to catch up with Aziraphale as he turned a corner.

“I don’t—we don’t—we could simply, ah, each plan our own part, and, and then alternate when it’s time to teach it.” He turned down another sidewalk.

“Whuhhh…sorry, what?” Crowley spluttered, hurrying to catch up yet again. “That’s—that’s not a plan. We have to…aahhhh…coordinate. Something.”

“I’m sorry; I simply can’t speak about it at the moment,” Aziraphale said, attempting a firm tone—but Crowley could see his eyes flitting away skittishly.

“Aziraphale,” Crowley said slowly, or as slowly as he could when he was jogging to keep up with Aziraphale’s speed walking, “did you have an…odd…conversation with your chair about this class?”

“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Aziraphale said quickly.

“You diiiiiid,” Crowley concluded.

“I—I certainly can’t confirm anything of the sort,” said Aziraphale, confirmingly.

“Oh, come onnnnn,” wheedled Crowley. “I’ll tell you about mine if you tell me about yours.”

“That’s completely out of the question,” Aziraphale snapped, heading in a new direction. Crowley suspected he was doing it at random.

“Agh—alright—fine,” Crowley said. “Let’s have lunch.”

Aziraphale finally slowed. “Lunch?”

“Yes, lunch,” Crowley repeated. “Y’know, the mid-day meal.”

“I know what lunch is, you—” Aziraphale pressed his lips together, suppressing whatever he might have called Crowley (much to Crowley’s disappointment—he’d gotten hopeful that they’d progressed to name-calling already).

“Right, soooo, since I still don’t know any restaurants, really, maybe you could show me another one?” Crowley’s tone wasn’t pleading, quite, but it was in the neighborhood. The tense lines around Aziraphale’s eyes softened fractionally. It was…distracting. “Uhhhh…weren’t you on your way to lunch anyway?”

“Ah—well…yes, I suppose so.” They’d come to a stop under a spreading tree (white oak, Crowley identified automatically), leaves yellowing around the edges in the August heat.

“And it’s Friday”—Crowley worked to keep his voice smooth as he tried to force his breathing to return to normal—“last Friday before the semester starts…good time for a long lunch, yeah?”

“Hmm,” said Aziraphale, visibly wavering. “If you put it that way…”

Crowley spread his hands. “It’s just lunch. Showing your new colleague the best places to eat in this town.”

“Oh, very well.” Aziraphale still managed an air of grumpiness. “But this is strictly social.”

“Of course, of course,” Crowley reassured him. He looked around. “Where the Hell are we, anyway?”

Aziraphale also looked around at the world outside their tree. “Oh dear,” he sighed. “I believe we’re in the Engineering quad.” Then his gaze turned thoughtful. “Although…if we’re already on this side of campus…how strongly do you feel about the…ah…healthiness…of what you eat?”

“Nnnehhh,” Crowley shrugged. “I don’t…really worry about it? Food isn’t really my top priority, as long as it keeps me functioning.”

“I’d noticed,” said Aziraphale, his eyebrows doing something sardonic, and it occurred to Crowley that, somewhere in Aziraphale’s background, there was at least one Southern grandmother insisting that you should take another casserole helping, and you haven’t even had any of the mashed potatoes yet, sweet pea.

The restaurant was called the Ritz, and had exactly one similarity to its namesake, in that it occupied space on the ground floor of a hotel.

Admittedly, “hotel” might be a generous term. Its sign identified it as the Tennessee Motor Inn (presumably. The sign actually read TN MOTO INN), and Crowley could feel lumpy-mattress-back-pain just from being in its vicinity. He would have bet actual money that the only reason the Inn stayed in business was its rent income from the Ritz.

Dining at the Ritz came with instructions, or at least it did if you went with Aziraphale.

“ _Don’t_ order anything that’s described as “healthy,” he’d told Crowley as they had made their way out of the Engineering quad. “Mr. Sable—ah, Raven Sable; he’s the owner—runs a health food and supplement business on the side, and he pilots everything in the restaurant.”

“So what’s wrong with a health food business?”

“Well, as far as I can tell, it’s not actually _food_ ,” said Aziraphale delicately as they crossed the heat-shimmering asphalt of the parking lot. “I suppose there’s a market for it, but I _don’t_ recommend it. Oh, and don’t stare at the cook; he chooses to express himself in his own way, and we should all respect that.”

“Express himself what way?” Crowley asked, but by then they’d reached the place. Crowley could feel a layer of grease settling on his skin, along with the sweat that was already trickling down his arms and back from his unexpected cross-campus trek. But Aziraphale, in all his buttoned-up neatness, strode in and across the lightly grease-slicked floor without hesitation, waved cheerily to someone, and took a seat by a window at what was clearly _his_ table. The window itself was smudged with possibly generations of oil and fingerprints, but still had a startlingly good view eastward of the university campus, with its green-ridged backdrop of Appalachian Mountains, blurring away into blue-grey summer haze.

“So what _is_ safe to eat?” Crowley asked, unfolding a thin paper menu.

“Mr. Sable!” Aziraphale exclaimed, which was confusing until Crowley looked up to see the restaurant’s owner standing by their table. In fact, he looked at least twice—Raven Sable was imposingly attractive. “How are you, my dear? And what is Elvis cooking up today?”

 _Elvis_?

Crowley peered toward the back of the restaurant and immediately realized what he wasn’t supposed to be staring at. The cooktop was being manned by—well, it presumably wasn’t _actually_ Elvis (maybe), but there was a well-greased black wig, a pair of smoky shades, and a gold-spangled white jumpsuit. Crowley blinked a few times and turned back to Aziraphale and Sable’s conversation in time to catch the end of a description of an experimental steak-and-cheese something or other.

“That sounds delicious,” Aziraphale smiled. “I’ll have that, and a bottle of that lovely sweet tea you began stocking last month.”

“Oh, come on, now, Dr. Fell”—Sable’s voice was smoothly ingratiating; Crowley was impressed—“you _have_ to try my newest drink. _So_ many more nutritional ingredients than tea. It’s all detailed in the flyer.”

“I’m sure it is, my dear,” said Aziraphale, with a firmness that Crowley hadn’t seen before, “but I’m afraid I have a terrible craving for sweet tea, and that new type has a delightfully unique flavor that I simply must try again.”

Sable sighed with a credible emulation of genuine sadness. “Oh well. I haven’t given up on you, yet, though. But what about your friend?” He turned to Crowley with a speculative look.

“Oh, he’s not my friend,” Aziraphale said immediately. “We’ve only just met, really. We’re colleagues, nothing more.”

Crowley shouldn’t have been bothered by this. He was specifically trying to avoid starting a friendship, after all.

Nonetheless, his smile was very forced.

“I’ll take the same as him,” he said, waving a hand at Aziraphale without looking at him. “No health drink. No offense; it’s just that I’m morally opposed to health food. I’ll have an apple ale.”

Sable was unimpressed—that face made disdain look unreasonably hot—but went off to put their order in. Crowley turned back to Aziraphale, only to be hit with a dryly raised eyebrow that, despite the very different color scheme, was just as overwhelmingly attractive as Sable’s.

“Morally opposed to health food?”

“Nnehh,” Crowley shrugged. “I had to say something. By the way, is he single?”

“Yes,” said Aziraphale, with a sigh that was a touch regretful, “very intentionally so. He’s asexual and aromantic, and deeply committed to walking around in the world as a paragon of untouchable beauty.”

“Ah,” said Crowley, and had to stop there, because—to his mild horror—the next offering his brain produced was _and what about you?_ “Ngk,” he said instead.

The apple ale was decent. The food was—well, Crowley had expected some kind of imitation of a Philly cheesesteak. This was _not_ that.

“What did we order?” he asked, angling his plate to view all sides of the concoction.

“ _You_ weren’t paying attention,” said Aziraphale, the corners of his mouth somewhere between disapproving and amused. He took a precise bite and gave a small moan of satisfaction.

That might become distracting.

Had Aziraphale done that during their lunch the previous week? He’d definitely visibly enjoyed the crepes, but surely it had been more subdued?

Had Crowley leveled up to a new layer of Aziraphale-ness? The “trusted with happy food noises” level?

(And if he had, why did he care?)

And how long had he been staring slackly at Aziraphale eating? He pulled himself together and tried a bite of whatever was on his plate.

“Oh,” he said. “Ok, yeah, that’s…that’s pretty good.”

Aziraphale didn’t _say_ I told you so, as his mouth was otherwise occupied, but his eyebrows indicated it. Crowley cast around for another conversational topic before he could get lost again in watching Aziraphale eat.

“So who in the department is homophobic?” he found himself saying, and mentally kicked himself. Bringing up homophobia was not exactly in the same league as his usual attempts at being deliberately annoying.

“Sandy,” Aziraphale replied without missing a beat, before Crowley could take it back. His eyes darted automatically around the mostly-empty restaurant before returning to Crowley. “Not that he gets much of a chance to do anything about it.”

“You’re not telling me Gabriel shuts him down?” Crowley asked, skeptically.

Aziraphale held back something a lot like a snort. “I’m…ah…afraid not.” His eyes did that nervous scan of the room again before discussing his department chair. “Gabriel—bless his heart—is every form of unacknowledged privilege, wrapped up in a well-tailored suit.”

It was Crowley’s turn to hold back a snort.

“But, thank the Lord,” Aziraphale continued, “half the faculty are LGBTQA”—he pronounced the letters conscientiously—“and B would murder—literally murder, I’m fairly certain—anyone who was overtly homophobic, so Sandy’s limited to dog whistles that Gabriel won’t notice, and grumbling about how you can’t say anything without offending someone these days.” There was a certain savage satisfaction under Aziraphale’s softness that stirred up…something…in Crowley.

“Half the faculty?” he asked, to distract himself.

“Well, I haven’t calculated the actual percentages,” said Aziraphale. “But B’s nonbinary, of course, as is Uri, and Michael is genderfluid. Dagon is gay, and Hastur and Ligur are married, as I’m sure you know—”

“Wait—Hastur and Ligur are married? To each other?”

“Oh,” said Aziraphale. “Yes. Apologies. I suppose, for professors in the field of Language Arts, they’re really rather uncommunicative.”

“Hnng,” Crowley said. “There really is someone for everyone. And then I guess there’s us.”

“Ahh…I beg your pardon?”

“I mean—gay and faculty?” He couldn’t have possibly gotten that wrong, could he?

“Right, yes,” said Aziraphale, relaxing. “Yes, of course. I suppose I did forget to count myself. And—oh, Mr. Sable, dear?” The only-to-be-admired-from-a-distance Sable had paused by their table again. “Could I trouble you to order two of those exquisite fried apple pies?”

* * *

“That was scrumptious,” Aziraphale sighed as he finished his last bite of fried pie. The greasy haze of the Ritz, populated with inexplicable Elvis impersonations and ambitious inventors of non-food foods, was soothingly disconnected from the refined atmosphere of his professional life. He found that he had very little desire to return to his office just yet. “What are you in the mood for now?” he asked Crowley.

“Alcohol,” said Crowley firmly, tapping a spoon on the rim of his bottle with a ringing chime. He pointed the spoon at Aziraphale. “You should have some too.”

Aziraphale made an effort to look scandalized. “I can’t drink during the work day.”

“Oh, balls,” Crowley dismissed this. “Nobody’s at work today. You were practically the only one in the building. It’s the Friday before the semester starts, and I _know_ you’ve gotten all your paperwork in and…ehhh…doublechecked your syllabi three times.”

Aziraphale squinted a bit at the math there (would that be six total checkings of his syllabi?), but it was true that there wasn’t anything he _had_ to finish this afternoon.

“Two apple ales, thanks,” Crowley was already saying to Mr. Sable, who’d paused inquisitively by their table.

“You’re a terrible influence,” Aziraphale frowned at him.

“I do my best,” Crowley grinned. “Oh—speaking of which, probably. The…ehnnng…custodian. Shadwell. What’s his deal?”

“Oh,” said Aziraphale, rubbing his forehead. “I suppose I should have included him when you asked about homophobia. He’s not…consistently homophobic, necessarily. It all depends on who’s trying to take over and/or destroy the world according to whichever conspiracy theory he’s currently caught up in. Over the summer it was witches—specifically Swedish ones; I’ve no idea why—but I _think_ he’s switched to nuclear power plants. Again.”

“Going to blow up and kill us all, are they?” Crowley nodded, popping the tops off both their apple ales and handing Aziraphale his.

“Thank you, my dear. And no, I’m afraid that would be too logical. It’s something to do with making all the lemon candy radioactive. I’m not sure of the precise details. Mmm, this isn’t bad.”

“Told you so. Guess I’d better avoid lemon candy, then. Is it specifically lemon, or is it anything yellow? Should I stay away from anything banana-flavored?”

Aziraphale certainly did not giggle, though he did lose track of the time he spent detailing Shadwell’s more entertaining theories for Crowley. They finished their apple ales and moved on to a stout—Aziraphale’s recommendation, this time.

“Oats of Wrath?” Crowley read, his eyebrows hovering between appreciation and scorn. (Since when, Aziraphale wondered, had he become fluent in Crowley’s eyebrows?)

“It’s local,” he explained. “Leave Before the Rush Breweries—it’s owned by a friend of Mr. Sable’s—Mort. He’s, ah, very tied to a certain aesthetic.”

“Yyyeah,” said Crowley, eyeing the label, which featured an illustration of a cloaked reaper in a field of skulls. “Well, you gotta admire commitment. What were you saying about Shadwell’s Jezebel obsession?”

“Ah, yes, that. Every few months he makes a fuss accusing Tracy of being a dominatrix and a medium. Of course she _is_ a dominatrix and a medium, but that’s not the point.”

“She’s _actually_ a medium? I thought it was just a look.”

“Oh, yes, she has a variety of interests. Of course, she’s more than capable of handling Shadwell. You must drive by her place sometime; it’s a bit of a landmark. ‘Madame Tracy Draws Aside the Veil.’ It’s on the way to a really excellent barbecue place that’s impossible to find otherwise—”

“Mph,” Crowley interrupted, brandishing a skull-decorated bottle at him, “ _why_ was Madame Tracy yelling at me about escaping frogs this morning?”

“Oh,” Aziraphale sighed. “There was…an incident last semester.”

“An _incident_?” Crowley’s eyebrows did that distractingly well-arched lift over his sunglasses. Aziraphale should have been used to it by now. “Another Shadwell thing?”

“Ah, well, no.” Aziraphale briefly wondered if it was permissible to relate this, but…”You’ll find out about it eventually,” he conceded. “You may as well hear the accurate version first. I should preface this by saying that no frogs were harmed.”

Crowley choked into his stout. “Wait, there were real live frogs? We’re—we’re the _English_ department, for God’s sake, not the—the—wherever frogs would be. Wait. Did someone raid the—the frog department?”

“No—no raiding. Well, no raiding of other departments. They were Hastur’s frogs, and I’m _sure_ Uri didn’t mean any actual _harm_ —”

“Hastur’s frogs. Hastur has frogs? Wait—no, Hastur doesn’t have frogs; I’ve seen his office. No frogs.”

“Of course he doesn’t have frogs in his office _now_ , dear. After the incident, Gabriel and B instituted a “no pets” policy. That was the first time I’d seen them agree on anything, in fact. Of course, it would have been hard to disagree, at that point. The event was rather…universally horrific.” He closed his eyes for a moment at the memory. “Hastur was screaming—he has some very powerful vocal cords, as it turns out—and Ligur was dripping everywhere, and frogs were hopping off the walls—it took three hours to catch the ones that got into B’s office. And one of Gabriel’s suit jackets was completely ruined.”

Crowley gaped. “Why…why was Ligur dripping?”

“From trying to stop the tank as it went over, of course. Oh, he _was_ furious.”

“At Hastur?”

“Oh, my, no, of course he wasn’t angry at Hastur—he was angry _on behalf of_ Hastur. They’re really very protective of each other. I—I suppose it’s appropriate, for husbands.” Aziraphale wasn’t entirely sure, having never been married himself, and certainly never having had that level of protectiveness directed toward him by any of his…relationship partners.

“Huh,” said Crowley, then frowned. “What did any of that have to do with the Apop—Acapulp—disaster class? Tracy definitely said it had something to do with the Applelisp—the class.”

“Ah, well—last year was Uri and Hastur’s year to teach it, and Uri...visited Hastur’s office to…check in about something, and—well, they said the table with the frog tank was shifted in front of the door, and they tripped over the leg, and there was no way they could have known that it was so loose…” He trailed off, suddenly glad of his beverage, which allowed him to take a sip and wave his hand vaguely, pretending to be distracted. He’d never questioned Uri’s version of the story, though it conflicted with Hastur’s furious accusations. But now, with Gabriel’s instructions still rattling around in his head, he found that he’d lost some confidence in the…well, the _virtue_ of his own side.

“Frogs,” Crowley muttered into his own drink. “What about”—he squinted, visibly despite his sunglasses—“Antichrists? In the elevator?”

“Oh, that,” said Aziraphale, rolling his eyes. “That was…not last Spring but the previous one, when Michael and Ligur were teaching the course. Ligur denied any responsibility, of course, but… _somehow_ …some, ah, decidedly unusual images kept showing up in Michael’s slides.”

“Unusual images?” Crowley echoed, smirking. “You mean porn?”

“Ah, well, no, actually,” Aziraphale replied. “They were…well, I suppose they might be considered… _demonic_ , to someone with that type of imagination. And, given their…apparently inexplicable origin…some of the, well, more imaginative undergraduate students developed some…rather unfortunate theories about them. I believe there may have been a few—um—social media discussion forums that were dedicated to them.”

“Conspiracy theories,” said Crowley, tilted upsettingly far back in his chair. “The Apocalypse class had its own conspiracy theories.”

“Well. Yes,” admitted Aziraphale. “Very Apocalyptic conspiracy theories, in fact. Nobody was ever sure who began planting posters in the elevator, of course.”

Crowley rubbed his face, briefly dislodging his sunglasses, but without revealing his eyes. “Antichrists and raining frogs,” he summarized. “What about…errrr…crying undergraduates in Tracy’s office?”

Aziraphale pursed his lips. “That could be any of the years, honestly. One time Dagon graded the papers Sandy had assigned, and failed everyone—she said their thinking wasn’t sufficiently organized—and one time all the materials the students needed for B’s assignment went missing—someone found them months later in the botany department—”

“And nobody knew who’d delivered them there or why, was that it?” Crowley asked dryly.

“…Possibly,” said Aziraphale, avoiding his eyes. Well, his lenses.

“So,” said Crowley, leaning forward so that the front two legs of his chair came down with a crash, “both sides’r…ehhh…undermining each other. Trying to look better than the other, but…but they just keep canceling each other out. Nobody looks good, you just have…frogs and conspiracy theories and tears.”

“Mmmnn,” said Aziraphale uncomfortably.

“What’re you gonna do when it’s our turn? Steal my plants and put them down the disposal?”

“I would never!” Aziraphale was appalled.

Crowley might have fought back a smile. “And I’d have to…rearrange all your books, or something.”

“You wouldn’t!” Aziraphale gasped. “Ah…would you?”

“Nahhh,” said Crowley, sitting back more comfortably. “I’d be too afraid of your wrath, angel.”

Aziraphale sniffed. “Don’t be silly.”

“I’m just saying, we need to plan something. Otherwise we’ll end up with missing books and crying undergraduates like everyone else. And I’m really not one for making undergraduates cry. Well, not on purpose.”

“No,” said Aziraphale, shifting on his vinyl-covered seat. “Nor am I. But I—I don’t think we’re supposed to plan it _together_. We’re supposed to…to thwart each other. Planning it together would…well, wouldn’t that be the opposite of thwarting each other?”

“Errhh…welllll…” Crowley waved another skull-adorned bottle vaguely (they’d both gotten another stout somewhere along the way), “how’re you gonna thwart me if you don’t know what I’m doing? You have to, y’know, stay informed about what I’m planning. Otherwise, who knows what kind of wicked wiles I’d get up to?”

“Wicked wiles?” Aziraphale echoed. “Seriously?”

“Nnnrrrhhh,” Crowley shrugged with most of his body. “You get the point, though.”

“It is…a point,” said Aziraphale cautiously. “I suppose my side couldn’t complain about my meeting with you if it were for…well…keeping track of your plans.”

“Thwarting,” reiterated Crowley, apparently just because he liked the word. “And my side can’t complain either, not if it’s for…espy—espin—epi-pen—spying.”

“Well…” said Aziraphale, still trying to sort through this. “When you put it that way…we _would_ both still be following instructions.”

“Exactly,” said Crowley. “We’d be like”—his hands sketched symmetrical half-circles in the air—“double agents.”

“Double agents,” Aziraphale repeated. He found that he was smiling in spite of himself. Somehow he felt lighter now than he had at any point since that conversation with Gabriel and Sandy a week ago. “I’ll be damned.”

A smile had stolen across Crowley’s face as well. “It’s not so bad, when you get used to it.”


	5. Tablets and Composition Books

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We're finally progressing through the first semester! Features "working" lunches, Crowley standing on a couch, bedtime stories, and Pompeiian graffiti.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warning: Ableism (in relation to dyslexia and accommodations) is discussed in this chapter but does not occur in the story.

Crowley was spying.

When he pictured spying, he typically didn’t imagine “standing frozen in plain sight in an empty room,” but since the people he was listening to didn’t know he was there, it counted as spying, right?

His targets were, evidently, on the floor of Tracy’s otherwise deserted office, somewhere on the opposite side of her desk. He was only there to check his mailbox—he’d waited until he was sure Eric would be gone—but apparently he wasn’t the only one utilizing the area after hours.

“That was excellent, my dear!” It was Aziraphale’s voice, warm and patient. “Are you ready for the next page?”

“No,” came a child’s voice, full of frustration, and Crowley tensed, memories of childhood reading assignments suddenly uncomfortably clear. “The letters are moving around again.”

“Oh, I’m terribly sorry.” Aziraphale’s voice, on the other hand, was entirely _unlike_ anything from Crowley’s reading-related childhood memories. “Shall I take a turn, then?”

“Ok,” the child’s voice agreed. Crowley had inched silently forward enough to surmise that she and Aziraphale were sitting with their backs against Tracy’s desk. He could see two pairs of ankles—well, strictly speaking, he _couldn’t_ see Aziraphale’s ankles, nor could he imagine doing so. What he could actually see were Aziraphale’s pale khaki pants, sticking straight out on the floor but neatly crossed at the point where the pants cuffs met his gleaming tan loafers (from 1950 _at the latest_ ), in stark but still companionable contrast to the much more relaxed ankles of a child with medium brown skin and rainbow sandals.

“At night,” Aziraphale read, his voice dropping expressively (Crowley blinked, although he probably shouldn’t have been surprised that Aziraphale had a dramatic reading voice), “the lions climb the tree to sleep.” It was ridiculously overdone. Why was Crowley smiling? “Would you like to read the next one, dear?”

“Um…” There was a giggle now in the child’s voice, dispelling the frustration, and Crowley found himself silently rooting for her as she read painstakingly, “They hunt for food on the plains.”

“Brilliant!” Aziraphale exclaimed. “Do you want the next one, or should I take it?”

“You,” she said unhesitatingly. “I’m tired.”

“That happens to everyone, not to worry. I can certainly take over from here.”

“ _You_ don’t get tired.”

“Oh, I assure you I do sometimes. But I have had a good deal longer to practice, you know. I’ve had…oh, let’s see, forty-two minus seven is…oh, thirty-something years. Numbers don’t stick very well in my head, my dear, just like letters don’t stick very well in yours.”

“I don’t wanna practice for thirty years.”

“Oh, very good point. I promise you won’t have to practice words the entire time.”

“You know,” said Crowley, sliding into view around the corner of the desk, “there are some other options you should know about also.”

“Crowley!” Aziraphale’s face had lit up in a surprised smile.

“Um,” said Crowley. He was pretty sure he’d had something witty to say, a second ago.

“Eve,” said Aziraphale, “this is Dr. Crowley, our newest professor.”

“Just Crowley,” said Crowley. “Don’t get up; I’ll join you.” He folded his limbs into a configuration that let him seat himself to Eve’s left, his back to the desk also, matching Aziraphale but on her opposite side.

“Hi,” she said, extending a hand. Crowley shook it; it was tiny but firm in his.

“Good to meet you,” he said automatically. “And good reading, by the way. I was gonna show you an app.”

“Is that an iPhone or an Android?” she asked, eyeing his phone as he brought it out.

“iPhone,” he assured her, showing her the apple on the back. “Can I see your book?”

He pointed the camera at the text about lions, and his reader app’s smooth, mechanical voice read out the sentence Eve had just mastered.

Her eyes lit up, and she promptly took the phone so she could try it out herself.

“When you get older,” he told her, “if it’s still hard, there’s this and lots of other ways to help yourself out with reading.” He spent a few minutes showing her a few other apps, avoiding Aziraphale’s gaze, which he was confident would be judgmental. Eventually Eve was called away by Tracy, who looked down at Aziraphale and Crowley with a wink and told them to be sure to turn out the light and close the door before they left.

“Bye, Crowley! Bye, Dr. A!” Eve said cheerfully as they were left alone.

Crowley finally directed his gaze to Aziraphale. “Well?” It came out a good bit more petulantly defiant than he’d meant.

“Yes?” Aziraphale asked, quizzically.

“Just—go on and tell me off and get it over with.” Crowley was mentally rehearsing his anti-ableism rants, and not enjoying it as much as usual.

Aziraphale looked perplexed. “Tell you off…for what?”

“For…ehnnnngh,” Crowley replied, waving a hand at the space between them to indicate…Eve, the app, dyslexia aids, whatever.

Aziraphale’s eyebrows creased further. “You gave her knowledge that will help her advocate for tools for herself if she needs them. What on Earth would I tell you off for?”

Crowley stared at him and found himself sagging deflatedly against the desk. “…Oh.” He wasn’t really sure what to do in this situation if he didn’t need to fight.

Aziraphale cocked his head to the side, gazing at him, and then shook it briskly. “We seem to be on the floor again, my dear.”

“Uhhh…yeah. D’you wanna relocate?” Crowley scrambled up and extended a hand down toward Aziraphale, remembering belatedly that Aziraphale was far more coordinated and solidly-built than he was, and did not remotely need his help. Nonetheless, Aziraphale took the offered hand and allowed himself to be pulled upright, with a shyly grateful glance up through his eyelashes that made Crowley’s heart do something…fluttery.

“Do you find that, ah, application to be useful very often?” Aziraphale asked, busily moving away to check his mailbox (which was entirely empty).

“App,” corrected Crowley. “And yeah, that one’s pretty good. I keep track of whatever comes out—reader apps, spell checkers—I can’t spell for shit, but it’s not just for me; I keep a running list for when students need pointers, that kind of thing.”

“Goodness; I’m glad you said something,” said Aziraphale as they headed down the hall.

“Well, I wasn’t exactly just going to toss it out there.”

“Oh?” Aziraphale opened the stairwell door for him.

“Y’know, an English teacher who can’t spell. Some people are assholes about that kind of thing.”

Aziraphale’s face had gone all soft. “You thought I’d be a spelling snob?”

“Um,” Crowley fumbled, for once thinking that he should be slightly more polite than _you’re a Classics professor who dresses like you’re from Edwardian England; of course I thought you’d be a fucking spelling snob_. “I…uh. Might have gotten a vibe?”

“I’m a relic, my dear, not a snob.” Aziraphale said, and raised a finger as Crowley opened his mouth. “Not a snob about _that_ , yes, alright. I do realize I’m a snob about any number of other things.”

“Nnn,” said Crowley, neutrally.

“Oh, do hush.” Aziraphale paused as they reached the top of the stairs, and looked at him seriously. “To be quite honest, there likely was a time when I would have been much more of…that kind of snob. But, as I’m sure you’re aware, the English language is simply maddeningly unfair, and—oh, dear; I have an entire diatribe I could deliver, but I’m sure you don’t need it. What I meant, though, a moment ago, was that I’m glad you said something about your list of—ah— _apps_ —because I do know that the applications exist, but I’m never able to give students advice about specific options. I’m afraid I’m not very current in terms of modern technology.”

“You don’t say.”

Aziraphale huffed, which was—oh Hell, it was _cute_ , and Crowley was cringing at even thinking the word _cute_.

“I’ll email you the list if you want,” he said as they reached Aziraphale’s office. “You do use email, don’t you?” That earned him a look dry enough that he felt slightly dehydrated.

“I would greatly appreciate that, if it’s not any trouble for you,” Aziraphale replied, his tone deliberately as polite as ever. “Nobody else seems to be at all aware. Hastur’s mentioned having a dyslexia diagnosis, but he may be even less…technologically aware…than I am. And Gabriel”—his eyes did their customary nervous dart up and down the hallway—“well, I think he probably _is_ that kind of snob. And B probably _does_ know about that sort of thing, but…”

“But you’re afraid to ask them,” Crowley finished for him. Aziraphale didn’t deny it. “Definitely no trouble; I’ll send it to you. Do you…uhh…tutor a lot? I mean like with Eve?”

“Ah, I wouldn’t say I tutor her,” Aziraphale said quickly. “She visits the department with Tracy most Tuesday afternoons, and we spend some time together with a book; that’s all. I thought it might be nice for her to have some reading experiences that are enjoyable, and she does seem to find them to be. Unless she’s simply being very polite.” He raised his eyebrows at Crowley. “Why do you ask?”

Crowley shrugged. “I was thinking I wouldn’t have minded having you—err—a tutor like you when I was a kid.”

“Oh!” said Aziraphale, and did that flick of a glance up through his eyelashes. “Oh, thank you.”

Crowley’s heart did the thing again. Shit.

“Although again,” Aziraphale continued, “I’m really not a tutor, more of an…excessively educated babysitter. Ah—excuse me, if you don’t mind.” And he stepped into his office. How long had they been standing in the doorway?

“Are you…eughrrg…working late tonight?” Crowley asked, leaning against the doorframe.

“No, no,” said Aziraphale, rummaging. “Just gathering up my things.” He shifted what appeared to be a barometer and extracted a thickly-bound book from behind it.

“Do you want to get dinner?”

Aziraphale’s gaze snapped to Crowley, his eyes and mouth open and startled for two elongated seconds…and then—in a way that should have been imperceptible but was instead _very_ perceptible—his posture straightened, his spine stiffened.

“N-no, I—I couldn’t.”

“Rriiiiight,” said Crowley.

Had he just asked Aziraphale out?

…And been turned down?

“Um,” he croaked, “maybe lunch sometime this week? A—a working lunch, I mean, to start planning the Apocalypse class?”

“Oh!” A relieved smile broke across Aziraphale’s face. “A working lunch, of course. Yes, that would be splendid, my dear.”

They went back to the Bastille for their first working lunch (could he say _first_ working lunch? It was probably the first of…some number, right?), that first Friday of the new semester. Late August was still grinding along outside—Aziraphale explained something about a dome of high pressure that refused to shift—but the café was soothingly cool, buzzing with a good deal more activity than on their last visit. It was a “working” lunch in the sense that Crowley set up his tablet and keyboard, and Aziraphale brought out an honest-to-God composition notebook that _must_ have fallen into his office through a time portal from the 1940s. They then proceeded to talk about famous inaccurate snowfall predictions (Aziraphale) and classic historical astronomy misconceptions (Crowley) until they realized they both had to be back on campus to teach.

They tried again the next Friday, Crowley driving them to Mort’s Leave Before the Rush brewery. Aziraphale expressed appropriate and polite appreciation of the Bentley upon being introduced, and then much less polite sentiments during the drive.

“Crowley, this is central Tadfield—you can’t—you can’t drive as if you’re on I-75! And for the record, you can’t drive like that on I-75 either!”

“Why not?” Crowley frowned at him.

“Pedestrian, Crowley!”

At the brewery, surrounded by looming representations of death, they met Mort himself, who was absurdly tall and cavernously thin, with a nose that looked like an actual beak, and dressed in enough black that Crowley felt pastel by comparison. Crowley, who _liked_ spooky, was trying to convince himself that he wasn’t terrified, until Aziraphale twinkled up at Mort and asked after his mother. Mort replied in a deep rumble of a voice that warmed the listener straight through, and it occurred to Crowley that he might have been terrified of the wrong person.

Aziraphale flatly refused to let either of them try the actual beer (“We both have to teach in an hour, my dear, and besides, your driving is terrifying enough without the addition of alcohol”), so instead they split a giant sourdough pretzel and a sampling of dips. Well, “split” in the sense that Crowley ate enough to taste each of the dips, and then got distracted by the brewery’s little gift shop and left the rest for Aziraphale to finish.

Further Friday lunches continued in the same vein. Crowley quickly became convinced that Aziraphale knew literally every restaurant owner or chef in Tadfield and the surrounding area. A voice in the back of his mind occasionally muttered about how time was marching on toward the next semester, but he couldn’t quite achieve a sense of urgency, not when he could be watching Aziraphale’s glorious enjoyment of his food, or making him giggle over departmental gossip (obviously Crowley didn’t _giggle_ ), or debating the inherent morality of pandas.

By the end of September, they had a list of vague topics each of them might, sort of, think about covering in the Apocalypse class, and another list of half-baked ideas that could be passed off as “thwarting,” if you squinted.

“Hey, angel,” said Crowley, slinking into Aziraphale’s office, as usual now, on the first Friday of October. “I heard it was your birthday.”

“Well, it would be hard to miss,” said Aziraphale, with a moderately grumpy eye roll. He was correct—Gabriel, at some point, had presumably watched an “effective leadership” webinar, and retained exactly one idea, which was that employee birthdays should be acknowledged. Unfortunately, this was the lone initiative of his that Tracy actually agreed with. So now, whenever a birthday occurred, the entire department received an email “celebrating” the birthday person. Aziraphale’s had featured gifs of dancing Technicolor kittens holding hearts.

“Euurrgghh,” Crowley said sympathetically. “Anyway, I saw this on clearance in the little shop at Mort’s, and, um, figured you’d think it was funny.” He handed him a paper bag stamped with skulls.

“You got me a birthday present?” Aziraphale said slowly, looking at Crowley instead of looking in the bag.

“No—nngggg—I mean, it’s just a coincidence”—(it wasn’t)—“it’s just a joke, and I, uhhh, saw it was your birthday, and, y’know, thought I’d go on and give it to you.”

Aziraphale still looked sort of…lost, but he finally pulled his gaze away from Crowley, looked into the bag, and pulled out a small rock. Crowley watched his lips move as he read the painted words “Smart Rock Weather Report.”

_(Image: A small rock painted with: “Smart Rock Weather Report”_

_If the rock is HOT…SUNNY_

_If the rock is WET…RAINING_

_If the rock is COOL…OVERCAST_

_If the rock is WHITE…SNOWING_

_If the rock is MOVING…EARTHQUAKE_

_If the rock is MISSING…It’s been STOLEN)_

For a few seconds, Aziraphale looked completely blank, and Crowley began running through apologies, or excuses, or something—had he fucked up? But then he saw the exact moment that Aziraphale got the joke, the expressive lips curving into a smile, the smile growing as he finished reading, the eyes shining as he looked back up to Crowley as the smile turned into a whole-hearted, belly-deep laugh. It was a caliber of laugh that Crowley hadn’t seen from him before, and Crowley— _Crowley_ —had been the one to cause it—

“Crowley!” Aziraphale gasped, wiping his eyes. “Oh my. I”—he paused for more laughter—“I can’t believe I’ve never seen one of these before.”

“So…ehhhnnn…you like it?”

“Oh, Crowley—I love it. Let me find a location to display it. Oh goodness. That was _terribly_ nice of you.”

“Oh, shut it,” said Crowley. “I’m not nice; I’m an asshole. Just thought it was funny.”

Aziraphale was still laughing, those soft lips still beaming, the crows feet crinkling, and Crowley wanted to touch them; in fact, he wanted to grab the soft lapels of Aziraphale’s ancient coat and shove him into the cluttered bookcase so he could kiss those smiling lips, kiss them until—

Oh.

Shit.

This…this might be a problem.

* * *

Aziraphale might have a problem.

Well, he had any number of problems, of course, but this one involved Crowley. Although, to be honest, Crowley—from Aziraphale’s perspective—was several problems loosely contained in one improbably angular body—not that he was thinking about Crowley’s body; it was only an expression—

In any event, his problem at the moment, and the only one he planned to dignify with any attention at all, was the Literature and Language Ski—oh, fine, the Apocalypse class. Specifically, the timing of that class, and the way that timing continued to grow closer as the Fall semester approached Thanksgiving, and the way his half-hearted list of potential topics refused to grow longer.

He was at his desk on a Friday afternoon staring glumly at that list, still nearly the only page with writing in the little notebook he’d dedicated to this course, when—

“Angel, I need help.” Crowley himself, looking haunted, slipped into his office and closed the door. His clothing had transitioned with the weather from a close-fitting, black, short-sleeved shirt to a close-fitting, black, long-sleeved shirt, with tiny red buttons near the top that he rarely bothered with.

“Goodness, Crowley, what is it?”

“Eric,” he said grimly.

“Ah. Is he still after you to autograph a copy of that paper about self-photography?”

“Aaaggghhh, just say selfies,” Crowley groaned. “And I gave up and signed it two weeks ago. But it’s like trying to exorcise a demon. He pops up everywhere. Are you sure there’s just one of him?”

“You know, dear, this is your own fault for trying to be so…relevant.”

Crowley flopped down in the one chair that Aziraphale kept book-free these days. “I’m pretty sure you’re the only person I know who can make ‘relevant’ sound like an insult.” He sat up (slightly) straighter and pointed a long, slim finger at Aziraphale. “Speaking of which. This damned class. Lunch was great today, but we’ve still got nothing.”

“It’s not…nothing,” Aziraphale protested faintly, looking down again at his pitiful list. Lunch _had_ been excellent—they’d tried a new sushi place (a rarity for Tadfield), and Crowley had told him how he’d once accidentally gotten credit for creating a cult musical about the Spanish Inquisition. “Well, yes,” Aziraphale sighed. “It’s essentially nothing.”

“Alright,” said Crowley, nodding convulsively, “we’re just going to have to—to lock ourselves in somewhere until we get something hashed out. Um…I tell you what. Let’s get a couple bottles of wine from the Bastille dungeon, and go to one of our houses—can do it tomorrow if you’re free—and…nnngghh…not leave until we’ve got something coherent planned. Or we kill each other.”

“I’m sure there won’t be a need for violence,” Aziraphale frowned.

“Mehhhhh…most people want to kill me after spending that much time with me,” Crowley waved this aside, “but that’s not the point. The point is that we gotta get this done.”

“Ah…yes, I quite agree,” said Aziraphale, mentally stepping around whatever his emotions were doing with the idea that Crowley thought people wanted to kill him after prolonged contact. “Do you think it’s…wise to use alcohol?”

“Oh, stop being such a Baptist.”

“I’m not that kind of Baptist and you know it,” Aziraphale retorted. “I only meant that…shouldn’t we, well, keep our mental faculties at their maximum function?”

“Pffffft. I do my best work drunk. That’s the only way I got through that selfie paper.”

“I’m really not sure that’s a recommendation.”

“It’s my most-cited publication,” Crowley said, gloomily.

Crowley was at Aziraphale’s door with two bottles of wine by 10:30 the next morning. Instead of his usual tightly-fitted black shirt, he was in a tightly-fitted very dark grey shirt. Aziraphale wondered if that was his equivalent of “dressing down.”

“You’re late,” Aziraphale observed. He himself was in a sweater instead of his work-appropriate button-down ensemble.

“Ten a.m. is too goddamn early on a Saturday,” Crowley growled. Aziraphale had probably imagined that he gave his sweater a momentary surprised scan.

“You’re the one who said we needed all day.”

“The sun’s barely up!”

“Crowley, the sun has been up since 7:55.”

“And so have you, I’m sure.”

Aziraphale winced. “Since…a bit earlier than that, I must admit.”

Crowley stopped in the entryway, his head cocked to the side. “Insomnia?”

“A…touch of it. But…well…I’m also one of those people who needs less sleep than the standard eight hours a night,” Aziraphale confessed, hurrying on as Crowley opened his mouth—“which I realize is irritating, and…and we have a good bit to do, as you’ve pointed out, so I’d rather just skip that conversation if you don’t mind, and…are you coming?”

Crowley was still standing in the entryway, his eyebrows knitted above his sunglasses. “Why would your sleep pattern be irritating?”

“I…well, I’ve been rather firmly informed that it is, especially in close quarters.” That had been Raphael, of course. Aziraphale shifted his shoulders against his familiar ashamed flush.

“Well that’s…who the fuck…who critiques someone’s sleeping pattern?”

Aziraphale took in a breath. “I believe the phrasing was, ‘it’s creepy as Hell waking up to you puttering around at all hours of the night.’” Oh dear; _why_ was he telling Crowley this, and why today—this was supposed to be a day of professional collaboration, and even if it weren’t, the last thing he’d want to do would be to bring up his…relationship history. Or, for that matter, to give Crowley reasons to think Aziraphale was even more creepy, or dull, than he no doubt already thought. He looked again at Crowley’s odd expression and braced himself.

“I hope you left his ass,” said Crowley darkly.

And that was both so unexpected and so utterly inaccurate that Aziraphale let out a laugh before he could stop himself. “Well,” he managed, “the relationship _did_ end, not long after that.” Ended for the first time, anyway.

“Good,” said Crowley. “Forget that fucker and show me your house. And show me somewhere to put this wine before I drop it. And angel, there aren’t nearly enough books in this hallway.”

“You’re walking past a bookshelf at this very moment.”

“Yyeahh, but you can see all the books without moving other ones around. Not nearly up to your usual standard.”

“Well, this _is_ the entryway. These are the…the display books. Oh for Heaven’s sake, hand me the wine.” The bottle swinging in Crowley’s hand had nearly knocked over Aziraphale’s coat tree. “I’ll put these in the kitchen, and if it makes you happy, there are plenty of books just through there.”

“ _That’s_ more like it!” came Crowley’s voice from the living room, as Aziraphale located two wine glasses and a corkscrew. Crowley had gotten two reds, which were two of Aziraphale’s favorites (coincidentally, obviously). Aziraphale picked one to start with and went to join him.

“Angel, this is perfect,” Crowley said, grinning and sort of rotating on the spot to take in all the thickly-packed shelves lining the walls of Aziraphale’s living room. “Do you have library ladders? Like in Beauty and the Beast? You need library ladders.”

“Don’t be ridiculous; I can reach all of them perfectly well. And I have a footstool.” It was currently holding a stack of Latin dictionaries, but that was beside the point. “…And also my ladder got broken during the move to Tadfield.”

Crowley made a sympathetic noise and draped himself across Aziraphale’s couch, which had served mainly as a repository for bookshelf overflow until last night, when Aziraphale had unearthed it, with an eye toward Crowley’s furniture surface area requirements.

“’S this alright?” Crowley asked, flapping a hand at the wine bottle as Aziraphale set it on his coffee table (also excavated as of last night), and was it possible that he actually looked anxious? “’M not exactly a wine expert, so I asked Agnes what you like.”

“You…oh.” Aziraphale tried to digest this. “That was…that was very—”

“Don’t say nice,” Crowley stopped him. “Obviously I was researching your preferences so you’ll be more likely to get drunk, and I can…nrrr…manipulate the planning to go my way, or whatever.”

“Obviously,” said Aziraphale, pulling the cork with a satisfying pop. “Very wily of you, my dear. Not likely to be successful, mind you; I’ve never been drunk in my life, and I’m certainly not going to start today. But a point for good thinking.”

“Mrrghhh,” said Crowley. Then—“Never?”

“Beg pardon?” Aziraphale asked, handing Crowley a quarter-full glass. “Oh. Ah.” Oh, _darn_ , why did he keep _telling_ Crowley things? “I…I’ve never seen the appeal, I suppose.”

“Huh.”

“Please don’t take that as a challenge.”

“God, no,” Crowley replied, looking, for once, genuinely shocked. “That’s not—I mean, if you don’t wanna get drunk, don’t get drunk. ‘S just…I remember Eastgate in the ‘90s, y’know? Nobody’s better at getting drunk than Baptist kids figuring out how to do it without getting caught.”

Aziraphale barely avoided snorting into his wine. “That’s certainly true. Though I’m afraid I was still solidly in the…ah…non-drinking Baptist camp at that time.”

“You wouldn’t have wanted to get a Values Violation.” Crowley’s mischief-making smile was back, and Aziraphale let out another surprised laugh.

“Good Lord, I'd forgotten those. They got rid of them over a decade ago.”

“Did they?” Crowley’s eyebrows arched up.

“Well, it was a ridiculous system, as I’m sure you could expound upon easily. Even I realized it by some point in my undergraduate career.”

“’Spect you still never got one, though,” Crowley said, hanging a leg over the arm of the couch.

Aziraphale shifted in his armchair. “No, I never—honestly, Crowley, they weren’t that hard to avoid. Who’d _want_ to get a Values Violation?”

Crowley waggled his fingers. “Wore ‘em like a badge of honor, myself. Literally, actually—me and some friends made little badges that said VV. ‘Course, they looked like W’s, so nobody even knew what they were.” He sipped his wine. “Bit stupid, now I think about it.”

An hour later, Crowley did something on his phone that he claimed would order food. Sure enough, a smiling young person rang the doorbell in half an hour, handed Aziraphale a sack, blinked confusedly as he thanked them (“Oh, that’s lovely, my dear”), and vanished as quickly as they had appeared.

“I would say I can’t believe you’ve never used GrubHustle, but actually I definitely can believe you’ve never used GrubHustle,” said Crowley, setting out takeout containers on Aziraphale’s kitchen table.

“It seems rather impersonal,” Aziraphale said, but stopped complaining when the boxes proved to contain his favorite crepes from the Bastille, nearly as good as they would have been in the café itself.

“Maybe you should just teach them Greek,” said Crowley after lunch as they attempted actual planning again, perching improbably on the back of the couch as Aziraphale poured out the last wine of the first bottle.

“Hardly,” scoffed Aziraphale, who was trying hard not to be distracted by Crowley’s deep red socks (he’d shed his black boots at some point). “I’m a literature specialist, _not_ a linguistics professor. Besides, what would you do? Teach them emotion icons?”

Crowley gave a sort of horrified shiver at _emotion icons_. “Emojis, angel. And no, if anything, they’d have to teach me. Even I can’t keep up with emojis. I can do textspeak.” His eyebrows projected suspicion. “I hate to think of your opinion of textspeak.”

“Oh, I think it’s fascinating,” said Aziraphale. He rarely had a chance to discuss this topic, and he’d had just enough wine to wax eloquent. “It’s still language, evolving the way language has always evolved. Perhaps faster now, but language has always been fluid, is always being re-shaped. Humans will always find new ways to express themselves, but every system still has rules for how it’s done. You could take text-speech, or whatever you want to call it, and if you studied it properly, you’d find rules and syntax, and most of those rules would be the same rules, in essence, as the rules that governed Shakespearean English or Ancient Greek or Egyptian hieroglyphs. And—well…ah…apologies. I’m getting carried away. I shouldn’t take us off topic again.”

“Um,” said Crowley—he’d sat forward, his elbows on his knees and his fingers pressed together in front of his lips. “Actually, keep going, I think. I’m…just keep going.”

Aziraphale looked at him doubtfully but tried to reclaim his train of thought. “I was going to say that…ah…it’s not limited to written or spoken language alone, really. At a broader level, it’s human expression writ large—you can see patterns, over time, in how we tell stories, and the _form_ may differ, but at their core, the nature of the stories we tell, the way we perpetuate knowledge, across cultures and over time, is remarkably similar.” He paused, but Crowley still looked intent. “The human drive to be remembered, to be understood, to guide others to grasp something in the world in the same way you do—that drive results in similarities, over and over again, so that you could take a line, or a plot, written by a Greek playwright two and a half millennia ago and find something nearly identical written by an American author today.”

“Mmm,” Crowley nodded slowly. “Like when they found graffiti in Pompeii and it was basically dick jokes.”

Aziraphale gaped at him, closed his eyes, and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Yes, Crowley,” he sighed. “Like dick jokes in Pompeii.”

“No, no, I’m serious,” Crowley said, waving his wine glass. “’S like you said, people express themselves the same over time. People doing graffiti say the same dumbass shit whether it’s Pompeii in the first century or a high school bathroom stall in the 2000s, and people who write—uhnnngg—tragedies are gonna use the same basic plotline whether they’re in—I dunno, Thebes, or, or Hollywood.”

“That’s…that’s true,” agreed Aziraphale, feeling his way forward slowly, “and learning the modern version that’s more fitted to one’s own culture might make it easier to then understand the older version, and see the same…themes, the same experiences…”

“Yes!” said Crowley, half-standing on the couch and running his free hand through his hair. “Clever angel! Ha! Bastards had us distracted, thinking we had to compete with each other. But that’s stupid, the different sides thing is stupid, I always said it was. We gotta, y’know, marr—melt. Meld? One of those. Your classic stuff, my modern stuff.” He tried to illustrate by weaving his fingers together, but was stymied by the glass he was still holding. “There’s more wine, right?”

Aziraphale confiscated his glass and went to get the second bottle.

“Like The Lion King is basically Hamlet,” Crowley said, some time and about half a bottle of wine later.

“And West Side Story is Romeo and Juliet, of course.”

“Angel, West Side Story is like two decades older than we are; it does _not_ count as current.”

“You never know; someone might be a…a fan of Broadway musicals.”

“ _Fine_ , but let’s try for something more recent than the ‘50s.”

“Rent?” suggested Aziraphale hopefully.

“That’s still older than the students will be.”

“So’s The Lion King, dear.”

“Ehnnggg—oh, fine, add Rent to the list; it’s based on something, right? Oh—definitely add Hamilton.”

“ _Hamilton_ ,” Aziraphale sighed, joyfully.

“Wait, you’ve seen Hamilton?”

“Of course I’ve seen Hamilton. Oh—but…well, it’s not based on anything—I mean, other than…well, Hamilton’s life. I mean, essentially it’s a biography. It doesn’t parallel any older works except in a very general sense.”

“Mmmrrrr…” Crowley considered this. “Ok—ok—but—like you said, general sense—there’s plenty of biographies in ancient lit, right? I mean, Richard II or whatever. So—”

“I keep telling you, Crowley, Shakespeare is _not_ classified as ancient.”

“Right, I know, ok, but the point stands, doesn’t matter whether he’s ancient or just old—and there’s plenty of actually-ancient biographies, right?”

“Of course; it’s an entire genre. So…”

“ _So_ , we could have a section on how humans use biographies for entertainment. Y’know, then and now. And—and—and, documentaries. Aaannnd—errr—parodies. Plenty of those around. Maybe The Office if that’s not too old. Y’think that’s too old for undergrads?

“Considering I've no idea what you're talking about, evidently it’s too new for me, so possibly not.”

“Oh hey—was there an ancient Greek version of The Onion? I bet there was. Please don’t ask me what The Onion is, angel.”

“I know what The Onion is, Crowley. And yes, the Greeks literally invented parody. Frankly, The Onion is mild by comparison.”

Yet another stretch of time later, Crowley leaned back on the couch in his closest approximation of an ordinary sitting position yet. The table between them was strewn with books, notepaper, and at least three electronic devices (Crowley tended to produce those from his bag like an aggressively updated Mary Poppins). “Aziraphale, I—I think we’ve got something. This…this is good.”

“Yes,” Aziraphale concurred, rubbing his eyes. “I do believe you’re right, my dear.”

“What…what time ‘s’it? Did we forget supper?”

“It’s barely seven,” said Aziraphale, with a glance at the grandfather clock in the corner. “I’m sure we could still get something. Though you are absolutely not driving.”

“Nope,” Crowley agreed, sliding sideways until he was stretched full-length across the couch. “Let’s just order again. I can’t cope with th’public right now.” He flailed his hand about on the table until it located his phone, while Aziraphale noted the implication that he, apparently, no longer counted as “public” to Crowley, and filed it away in the mental drawer where he kept things that should not be looked at too closely.

Their planning, admittedly, was decidedly more desultory after supper.

“Shit, my eyes are going buggy,” mumbled Crowley, who was horizontal on the couch again. He massaged his face, then—for the first time since Aziraphale had met him—took off his sunglasses, stretching out a long arm to deposit them on the table. “Don’t freak out.”

“Why would I…freak out?”

Crowley looked at him with eyes that were a very light brown, light enough to be called gold. The left pupil was elongated in a way that suggested a snake’s eye. The effect was certainly unusual, but also so… _Crowley_ …that it made Aziraphale smile.

“People tend to,” said Crowley. “Freak out, I mean. It’s a condition. Coloboma. Comes with light sensitivity, in my case.”

“I’m hardly people, dear boy,” Aziraphale pointed out. “Should I lower the lighting further?”

Crowley didn’t answer for a few seconds, gazing at Aziraphale. “Nah,” he said eventually. “What were we talking about?”

“Ah…you were asking about modernized translations of Antigone, I believe.”

“Right. Mmmph. No way can I look that up right now. D’you have one?”

“Crowley, I have twelve translations of Antigone within a ten-foot radius. But…I should point out…we’ve made considerable headway. And I do have church in the morning, so I’ll need to sleep eventually. Would you like to…ah…call it a night?”

“Prob’ly should rest my eyes a bit ‘fore I try to drive,” came the reply, a bit drowsily. “Y’wanna read it to me?”

“Read to you?” Aziraphale echoed.

“Sorry, never mind,” Crowley backtracked rapidly. “Just ignore me.”

“I wasn’t complaining, dear. I was…surprised, that’s all. I don’t…people don’t…ask for that.”

“I’ve heard you read. Nice reading voice. But I don’t want to ask if…I mean. Only if you want to.” Were Crowley's naked eyes always that vulnerable, under the sunglasses?

“My dear, I’m a trained vocalist who’s been known to recite Beowulf in the original Old English _for fun_. You wouldn’t be…inconveniencing me. Your problem would be ever getting me to stop.”

The grin that overtook Crowley’s face, now that Aziraphale could see all of it, was breathtaking.

He found his most modern version of Antigone and sat, feeling self-conscious at first, reading to a lone adult. But the voices and personalities came back to him as he went, until the story took over and he forgot himself. He’d expected Crowley to laugh at him after a while and tell him to stop, but the few times he thought to check for his reaction, Crowley was simply relaxed, his eyes closed and his eyebrows furrowed thoughtfully. When Aziraphale paused after a speech from the chorus, Crowley was _very_ still and silent, and…oh.

“Did I just…read you a bedtime story, my dear?” Aziraphale whispered.

No reaction.

Should he wake him?

Crowley _had_ said he needed to rest his eyes, though. Perhaps it would be best to…let him get on with it.

Aziraphale puttered for a while. No sign of wakefulness from the couch. He changed into pajamas. Crowley slept on. He looked peaceful and…unguarded…and Aziraphale felt a surge of…something…that he immediately put in the not-to-be-opened drawer in his mind.

He found a blanket and tucked it around him, because of course it would be irresponsible to let a colleague become too chilly, especially while a guest in his home.

“I suppose I’ll see you in the morning,” he murmured, and retreated to his bedroom.

He didn’t see Crowley in the morning.

The couch was deserted when he awoke, cracked his door, and peeked out into his living room. The blanket was folded neatly and draped over the arm of the couch where Crowley’s feet had dangled yesterday. The incomprehensible electronic devices had vanished. Other than the scattered books and notes, there was no sign that Crowley had been there at all.

Or—almost no sign. A piece of paper torn from Aziraphale’s own composition notebook was pinned under an empty wine bottle.

He picked it up and read, with markedly limited comprehension:

_Gd morning angel_

_Sry 4 sleepg. Thx 4 blanket. Also 4 rdg._

_Hv fun @ church. Don’t tell them u spent Sat drinking w a heathen, mt get a VV._

_C u Mon._

He read it several times. It was difficult to translate, after all.

He should throw it away and fix himself some breakfast. Where had his wastebasket gotten off to?

No matter, he could toss the note in the kitchen trash bin.

He folded it in half lengthwise and tucked it like a bookmark into the Antigone translation. He would hate to lose his place, after all.


	6. Anciens et Modernes, Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Apocalypse class, full steam ahead! Look for some familiar faces! Also, baaaasically, Mr. Harrison and Mr. Cortese show up, if you think about it.
> 
> This is just the first half of this chapter (Crowley's half). I've been a bit swamped this week; I'll add Aziraphale's half in a Part 2 next Tuesday!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies that this is only half a chapter, but I did want to keep to my Tuesday posting schedule in some way!

Crowley wasn’t nervous.

His leg wouldn’t stop jiggling, but that was normal for him. It was just…energy. Not nervousness.

And the way he kept reliving the past two and a half months definitely did not bear a resemblance to his life flashing before his eyes.

_He’d almost fallen over, that first Saturday at Aziraphale’s house, seeing him in a sweater instead of his bowtie and waistcoat. You could see nearly his whole throat, for God’s sake. That sweater had been blue and cream argyle. The next Saturday’s sweater had been green and tan with large brown buttons, that stretched just a bit over Aziraphale’s middle, and was open enough at the collar to show a tiny triangle of_ undershirt _._

Eleven undergraduates had taken seats by now. Twelve? No, still eleven—he’d counted the one with the horrible hair twice.

_The remainder of the Fall semester had flown past, in a blur of Autumn-colored mountainsides, Friday lunches, and wine-saturated Saturday planning sessions, punctuated uncomfortably with “check-ins” with B—not about what Crowley was planning to teach, but about how he was planning to ensure that he looked better than Aziraphale._

_“He’s going to be talking about Ancient Greek tragedies, that kind of thing,” Crowley assured them. “I’m going to be showing movies and using memes and gifs and emojis. It won’t even be a competition.”_

_“Zzzz,” B had said noncommittally. “And have you encountered any problems from him? Any sign he knows that’s what you’re planning?”_

_“He doesn’t suspect a thing.”_

Sixteen seated students now. Six minutes to go. _Why_ couldn’t Crowley make his leg stop jiggling?

_Gabriel had required occasional reports from Aziraphale as well, or at least Crowley had gathered so from the way Aziraphale wriggled and painstakingly refused to confirm it. Regardless of their chairs’ input, though, they had their course outline structured well before the semester ended, and a list of required-or-suggested textbooks sent to Dagon after only the third reminder email. Before the end-of-semester faculty meeting, Crowley had quietly slipped Aziraphale a BINGO card, and had immensely enjoyed the sight of Aziraphale’s lips twitching as he tried to contain his smile while they checked off squares._

Five minutes to go. Crowley’s fingers had started drumming on the desk he’d commandeered.

_The first Saturday in December, Aziraphale had asked that Crowley come over in the later afternoon instead of mid-morning, something about Christmas decorations, which had not prepared Crowley for walking into his living room to find—_

_“Aziraphale, you have a whole-ass tree in here.”_

_“Yes, dear, I’m aware.”_

_“How did it get in here??”_

_“I carried it, obviously.”_

_“You carried a_ tree _? By yourself?”_

_Aziraphale had given him a puzzled look. “A tree of that size isn’t especially heavy, you know.”_

_Crowley definitely didn’t know, but Aziraphale had been more than happy to tell him about the local tree farm he visited every year to cut his own tree, and to sample the fudge they sold in their little shop, “and their homemade chili is scrumptious, and it comes with free hot chocolate, and you simply must visit yourself sometime.”_

_“So, you’re telling me you cut down a tree, picked it up and loaded onto a wagon, tied it to the top of your tiny car, and carried it into your house?”_

_“There’s nothing particularly remarkable about that, Crowley.”_

_“Mmmrrrr—it’s just that I’m imagining you as a lumberjack now, and I don’t think I can unsee that. Did you wear flannel?”_

_“Don’t be ridiculous; I haven’t owned flannel in decades.”_

_Crowley, nonetheless, had been stuck with an image of lumberjack-Aziraphale ever since, that he’d repeatedly tried to file away—his mental filing cabinet for “images of Aziraphale” had a faulty locking mechanism—Aziraphale in flannel, blue and green to bring out his eyes, hoisting a Christmas tree one-handed. Sleeves rolled up to the elbows. A white-blond beard that was both bushy and fluffy. Light brown leather work gloves. Holding a hatchet._

_Shit._

Four minutes to go. The last-minute rush of students had started. Crowley kept going over the script in front of him, which was about to be relevant in…now three and a half minutes.

_It was a good thing they’d finished the bulk of their course planning before the end of the semester, because Aziraphale’s Saturdays over winter break had been taken up with choir rehearsals for his church’s “special Christmas music, and I do hope Terry has been able to engage higher-caliber instrumentalists this year. Last year—well, they were very_ nice _young people, but their intonation was…rather badly off.”_

 _He’d also taken to absent-mindedly humming the bass line of the various songs he was rehearsing, and Crowley, for the first time ever in four decades of existence, had experienced a twinge of temptation to attend a church service. He hadn’t done so (he wasn’t_ that _far gone), but he’d felt unexpectedly adrift over the break, his Saturdays now empty stretches of unstructured time._

Two minutes to go. They were supposed to have something like 45 students; Crowley had lost track of his counting around 27, but the room was nearly full by now. Which was _fine_ ; he’d been teaching for literally decades at this point; there was no reason to be nervous.

The clock hit 9:30.

They’d agreed to wait two minutes into the class, to give stragglers time to settle. It was a damned long two minutes. Crowley reminded himself of the rehearsing they’d done, the two weeks after the New Year. He wasn’t nervous. Definitely not.

Shit.

Shit shit shit shit sh—

At 9:32 precisely, Aziraphale walked in and began speaking Greek.

More accurately, he was _acting_ in Greek—it was his reading voice dialed up to (at least) 11, every gesture and expression absurdly overdone, and Crowley could have listened to that rich bass rumble for _days_. In any language.

Right now, though, his job was to advance the slides of the translation they’d created of the introductory lines of The Odyssey. Crowley hadn’t been happy with any of the “modern” translations available, so Aziraphale had re-translated it and Crowley had modernized it (“You can’t call Odysseus a ‘wicked smart dude,’ Crowley!” “Why not? The whole point is to make it sound like something kids would actually say.” “We live in Tennessee, dear boy; _nobody_ says ‘wicked smart.’”)

The students were unnaturally silent as Aziraphale’s flair for drama (and the translation on the screen behind him) took them through the quick sketch of Odysseus’s struggles—travel, shipwrecks, the deaths of his friends, rejected love, an arrival home to more trouble.

“But Poseidon continued to rage against him,” Aziraphale concluded ominously (in Greek).

There was a moment of utter silence.

…And the students burst into applause.

Crowley went boneless with relief.

But he couldn’t stay that way; he had to force his limbs to work and play his part.

He rose from his chair (legs thankfully functional enough to pull that off) and sauntered down toward the front, where Aziraphale was still beaming and flushed with his successful performance.

“Oh come on, Dr. Fell,” Crowley said scathingly. “You can’t expect to hold anyone’s interest with that load of old…stuff.” He was fairly certain he heard a student gasp.

Aziraphale bristled. “I beg your pardon, Dr. Crowley,” he snapped. “That ‘load of old stuff’ holds insights treasured by humanity for millennia.”

“Psh,” said Crowley. He’d reached the floor, several paces to Aziraphale’s left. They faced off like fencers. “Humanity these days has loads more interesting ‘insights’ than plays from millennia ago.”

“Nonsense!” Aziraphale (and his bowtie) crackled with offense. “Nobody modern can _hope_ to achieve the heights of expression reached by the ancients.”

“Those dusty Greeks can’t speak to modern lives,” Crowley scoffed. “Sure, they were fine for their time. But now they’re irrelevant.”

“Well, what would you suggest, then?” Aziraphale said frostily. “Since you’re so _relevant_.” (Crowley had to fight back a smile. Aziraphale still turned ‘relevant’ into a Hell of an insult.)

“Alright,” he said, nodding fiercely. “Try this.”

He clicked a button on the controller, and _Hamilton_ started. Crowley forced himself not to look at the students, though the intensity of their silence was making his skin prickle. The introduction took them through a hurricane, travel, deaths of friends, rejected love—

“And me,” said Aaron Burr, “I’m the damn fool that shot him.”

Crowley hit a button again and the screen went to black.

A student a few rows up whooped out loud, and the others exploded into applause again.

Relief was pounding through Crowley. He couldn’t stop himself from grinning, so he turned it into something savagely triumphant instead and took a belligerent step toward Aziraphale as the applause died down.

“Are you going to say that doesn’t achieve _heights of expression_?” he demanded.

Aziraphale sniffed, with dignity, then spun toward the students.

“What do _you_ say?”

A couple of students in the front row actually flinched backward. Nobody said anything for seven agonizing seconds.

“Uh,” said a voice about midway up, on the end of a row (Crowley recognized the positioning easily—avoid notice when you want to, keep an escape route available). “They’re kinda…the same?” The kid was white, with straight medium-brown hair that hung limply into his eyes.

“Is that so?” said Crowley, crossing his arms. (Not smiling, not smiling, not smiling.)

“The same?” Aziraphale’s acting was giving out; his delight that someone was grasping the point was starting to leak through. “Whatever do you mean, my dear?”

The student looked like he was regretting whatever life choices had led him to speak up at that moment, but he grimaced and forced more words out. “I mean, both of them were about these smart dudes who went through a bunch of sh—stuff, and worked really hard to make a difference, even though, like, stuff kept happening to them that they couldn’t control, and probably some of it was their own fault.”

“Goodness,” said Aziraphale, thoroughly failing to remain in character, “you can’t be implying that the ancients and moderns are simply…duplications of each other?”

“I think he _is_ saying that, Dr. Fell,” said Crowley. His own voice came out nearly as soppily proud as Aziraphale’s. Oh well. They had maintained the illusion for about as long as could be expected.

“He’s right, though,” said a student in the second row, a young Black woman with a natural hairstyle pulled back in a curling ponytail.

“Actually, he is right,” said the young man to her right.

“They’re both telling the audience about a famous person,” she easily overrode him. “And they’re explaining why they’re going to tell us the story of this person even though we’ve already heard about them.”

“But they’re not duplicates,” said the young man to her left, golden-brown curls flopping into his face as he leaned forward. “I mean not exactly. It’s the same idea, but about different people.” The young man on _his_ left, who was stickily eating a cinnamon roll, nodded enthusiastically.

“Hero with a thousand faces kinda thing,” said someone farther back.

Crowley leaned on the aging lectern, Aziraphale clasped his hands in front of his waistcoat, and they let the students go.

“Like how the main character always gets a magic sword and has to prove themselves worthy.”

“King Arthur and Luke Skywalker.”

“That’s very male-centric. Lots of coming-of-age stories don’t have to resort to violence.”

“There’s usually a scary forest. Or maybe a cave.”

“Or like when the characters meet aliens, or…or miniature people, or whatever, but it’s never really about aliens, it’s about showing what humans are like.”

“Which is why Star Trek is better than—”

Crowley held up a hand. “Before we get into _that_ debate,” he interrupted firmly, “although feel free to bring it to my office hours, let’s pause for a second to recap. You watched excerpts from two performances, written in different languages, for different cultures, 2500 years apart. And it took you about”—he looked at his watch, for show—“twenty seconds to find a similar message in them. Well done, by the way. Gold stars.” This produced a few awkward smiles from students who weren’t sure if they should be embarrassed by being happy to receive gold stars.

“But I imagine,” Aziraphale took up the thread, “that many of you have had the experience of finding…ah…older works to be perhaps somewhat difficult to relate to.” Appreciative grumbling rippled across the room. “And that’s understandable. The language might be tricky; the style might be something you’re completely unused to. And sometimes, to be very honest, the writers spend a great deal of time on topics you’ve never heard of, and you’ve no idea if it’s even relevant to the storyline.”

“But here’s the thing,” Crowley continued. “All those old stories were written by people. And people are still people, all the time. People in Ancient Greece—and Rome, and Ancient China, and Ancient Egypt, and the Mayan Empire—all got born, and went through puberty, and made bad jokes, and bitched about the government, and had relationships, and lost people close to them, and tried to make the world a little better. Or at least make a living.”

“And although some people do enjoy analyzing the intricacies of the original language,” Aziraphale said—

“He means himself,” Crowley interjected, scoring some giggles from the class.

“ _You_ spent half an hour explaining to me how to pronounce gif,” said Aziraphale without even a tiny pause (and pointedly pronouncing it jiff), “so you can hardly pretend that you don’t care about the intricacies of language.” This received _more_ giggles, and Crowley took a moment to be grateful that someone besides himself had seen and appreciated just how much of a bastard Aziraphale could be. “In any case,” Aziraphale went on, “if analyzing the minutiae of language isn’t your…thing…” (he didn’t actually put air quotes around “thing,” but Crowley heard them anyway), “or if that’s something you even find frustrating or off-putting, then it’s very possible to find other ways to get to what you might call the ‘heart’ of a work.”

“And that’s going to be your job this semester,” Crowley concluded. “No essays, no exams. But you have to take old stuff and make us care about it. Four genres, one work per genre.”

“We’ll be demonstrating, in class, various approaches that professionals have taken to achieve the same end in each genre,” said Aziraphale. “Meanwhile, you’ll be working in groups on your own creations, in any medium that can be shown to the class in some way.”

“Alright,” said Crowley, clapping briskly. “We’ll do questions and comments in a bit; let’s do housekeeping.”

The next half hour was taken up with handing out the syllabus, explaining Crowley’s list of helpful apps, demonstrating where exactly to click on the university accommodations webpage to get to anything useful, and other first-day-of-class basics. After that, they turned over the last 20 minutes of the class to the students (devices encouraged), to get a start on finding modern adaptations of tragedies, their first genre. (“Are you _sure_ it’s best to start with tragedies?” Aziraphale had asked. “Better than ending with tragedies,” Crowley had answered.)

The students were still buzzing as they left. Crowley turned to Aziraphale and saw his own happiness and relief mirrored on his face, and wanted to throw his arms around him in celebration—

“Ah—yes, my dear; did you have a question?” Aziraphale said to Crowley’s left shoulder. Crowley turned to see the brown-haired kid who’d started the discussion earlier.

“Uh, hi, Dr. Fell, Dr. Crowley. I’m Warlock, uh, Dowling.” He shifted as if to shake hands, but was holding too many things to pull it off. “I had a weird question.”

“Sure, what’s up?” Crowley asked, leaning on the lectern again.

“You were talking about accommodations, like for dyslexia and stuff, and I was wondering, um, if you have to have permission from your parents to apply for them?”

Crowley raised an eyebrow and shot a glance at Aziraphale, who looked concerned.

“I don’t believe so,” Aziraphale began.

“No,” Crowley said firmly. “You’re over 18, right?”

“Yeah, it’s just, my dad, he’s sorta the…old school type, I guess. He says that kind of thing is a crutch or whatever.”

Aziraphale pursed his lips in distaste. “It certainly is preferable to have parental support in this process—”

“Don’t listen to him,” Crowley interrupted. “Listen to me. There’s no reason your dad even has to know about accommodations. Do you have documentation of, errrgh, a diagnosis?”

“Um,” Warlock fumbled, “I’m…not sure.”

“As I was saying,” said Aziraphale, with an eye roll in Crowley’s direction, “while it is helpful to have parental support in the process, because that makes it much simpler to acquire the necessary documentation, there are a number of ways to proceed without parental assistance, or even knowledge, if necessary.”

By then, an anxious graduate student was ready to take the room for the next class, so they walked out with Warlock while they talked him through ways to hunt down his records.

“And if you need more assistance,” Aziraphale wrapped up, “please do come to either of our office hours.”

Warlock thanked them awkwardly and wandered off, head buried in his phone, which was likely its natural location. Crowley looked to Aziraphale across the space the kid had left between them.

“I must say,” said Aziraphale, smoothing his waistcoat, “that did seem to be a very successful first class session.” His eyes darted hopefully to Crowley, clearly seeking confirmation.

“Yep,” said Crowley. “That was, nnngg, yep. Successful.” Hadn’t he had a whole list of Really Awesome Things from the class that he’d wanted to start rattling on about, approximately four milliseconds ago? “Uh…y’up for lunch?”

“Oh,” said Aziraphale, as if he’d never heard of the concept. “I…I don’t know if we should…”

“Don’t be ridiculous, angel,” Crowley found words again. “A working lunch on a Tuesday isn’t any different from a working lunch on a Friday. Besides, we need to…ehhhnnn…debrief. Get some notes down while it’s still, y’know, fresh.”

“Ah…yes,” said Aziraphale, giving his sleeves little tugs. “That’s certainly true. Well. In that case, what are you in the mood for?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Funnily enough, I had planned this well before I had any idea that this chapter would coincide with the Hamilton film's release!
> 
> Lumberjack!Aziraphale is entirely @summerofspock's fault! (Check out [Under Construction](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23641006/chapters/56741293) for a full depiction.) Well...also Michael Sheen's fault to some extent. He will return in some fashion before this fic is done!


	7. Anciens et Modernes, Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Aziraphale POV continuation of Part 1 of this chapter! Features crystals, plants, and Aziraphale handling change in the way that he does (by denying it, mostly).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If anyone's interested, Crowley's birthday in this fic is May 10, or 5/10 if you're using American date conventions (I chose the date b/c it's Crowley's literal birthday, if you consider when GO was originally published). Aziraphale's, in this fic, is October 5, or 10/5.
> 
> Chapter-level content warnings:
> 
> \--There's some brief body-critiquing, though the only body that gets critiqued is David Tennant's. (Literally David Tennant's, not Crowley's.)
> 
> \--Bugs--there are pictures of a caterpillar and a butterfly toward the end.

Aziraphale said more than one quiet prayer of thanks, in the next week, for young Warlock’s interruption at the end of the Apocalypse class’s first meeting. He’d been on the verge of…oh, he wasn’t even sure what. But their first class together had been delightfully successful, and when he’d looked to Crowley at the end, Crowley had been so unrestrainedly happy, a look Aziraphale didn’t think he’d ever seen from him, and Aziraphale had wanted to…to wrap his arms around him, to protect that smile and hold onto it, and—

And he couldn’t do anything of the sort. Of course not. He and Crowley weren’t friends; they couldn’t be. They were simply colleagues. Colleagues who worked well together, which was certainly…unusual, given their departmental situation, but probably still just within the bounds of acceptability, if he kept a few key caveats handy.

Any sort of display of affection was, naturally, completely out of the question. And certainly out of the question in _public_. He’d simply been swept up in the joy of…of reaching their students so successfully. Obviously he wouldn’t be tempted toward anything of the sort again.

“Planning session on Saturday, angel?” Crowley asked as they left class on Thursday. They’d divided the class into groups, and had half of them summarize the plot of _The Lion King_ , while the other half summarized the plot of _Hamlet_ , then compared the two side by side. Then Crowley had played video snippets of Simba seeing his father’s image, and Hamlet seeing _his_ father’s ghost, and more than one person had shed tears. (One of them might have been Aziraphale.)

“Oh,” Aziraphale replied to Crowley now. “I…I suppose so.” He wasn’t entirely sure that they _needed_ a planning session this weekend, but surely it was best to over-prepare rather than under-prepare, given a choice.

He stepped into Tracy’s office to collect their mail. Crowley hung back just outside the door, as usual, to avoid Eric, although—

“Who are you?” came Crowley’s voice. Aziraphale turned around to find Crowley staring at a young man occupying what had been Eric’s desk last semester. “What happened to Eric?”

It was perhaps reasonable for him to be startled. Whereas Eric was Afro-Latinx, with delicately-applied eyeliner and dark curly hair in that interesting pointy style, the new assistant was white, with flatly-combed blond hair and blue eyes entirely devoid of augmentation.

“Crowley, this would be the new undergraduate assistant,” Aziraphale began—

“Oh, are you Dr. Crowley?” the young man asked, jumping to his feet. “I read your paper about selfies, and I wanted to ask you about it, because that part where you said that selfies represent the human urge to document yourself as, uh, part of an event, like the same way cave painters used to put outlines of their hands next to their paintings, that really made me think, and…”

Eventually they got Crowley extracted, without having to sign any copies of his selfie manuscript (at least for now).

“Did you _really_ write that bit about cave paintings?” Aziraphale asked him as they headed down the hallway.

“I was drunk, alright? One of my old students needed an intro article for a special issue of…hhnngghh…thingy. They were on a deadline, so I cranked something out. ‘S not my fault it’s got a—a cult following in the undergraduate assistant crowd, apparently. Why d’we have to have a new Eric anyway? I just got used to the old Eric.”

“Tracy’s undergraduate assistant changes each semester, dear.”

“I have to get used to a new Eric _every semester_?” Crowley demanded, horrified.

“I’m fairly certain he’s named Jonathan,” Aziraphale pointed out. “I’ll see you Saturday, my dear.”

But on Saturday he awoke to a horrible clanging from inside his walls, sighed resignedly, shuffled to his fuse box to shut off the breaker to his heater, and called his repairwoman as soon as it was humane to do so.

“Welp, I can’t fit you in until four this afternoon,” she told him, which was a good 48 hours sooner than he’d expected, based on the precedent of the past two years, so he accepted the appointment gratefully. He then had to wait a good deal longer until it could be considered humane to call Crowley.

“Wazzzzat?”

“Ah—hello, it’s me. Aziraphale.”

“Know’syou. Nbdy else’d call s’dmnearly ‘naSsstrdy.”

Apparently he’d still managed to underestimate Crowley’s sleep needs. He sighed and explained the situation, speaking slowly and in short sentences.

“Waaait,” said Crowley eventually, still thickly. “Didja say y’r heater’s out?”

“Yes— _yes_ , Crowley, that’s the entire point. So I’m afraid you won’t be able to come over after all—I suppose we could postpone until tomorrow afternoon, since theoretically it should be working again by then, but today simply won’t work; you’d be dreadfully uncomfortable, and it would be terribly rude of me to expect you to—”

“Angel—Aziraphale— _Aziraphale_. You’re being ridiculous. Just come over to my place.”

“Come over…to…your place?” That seemed…surely that was… “I don’t think my side would…like that very much.”

Crowley snorted rudely. “Fuck your side. Howzit any different from me coming over to your place?”

“I…well…it’s not, I suppose, but…” It _felt_ different, though logically he couldn’t find an actual difference.

“Aziraphale. Your heater’s out. It’s January. Y’can’t sit in a fucking freezing house all day.”

“It’s not remotely close to freezing today, Crowley, and I’m quite accustomed to managing in a cold house; I was perfectly fine when the heater went out last year, and the year before.” He loved his house; it had _personality_. However, one of its personality quirks was an aging heating system that only one person in the Tadfield area was qualified to repair.

“Your heater goes out _every year_? Are you _nuts_? You can’t—look. Angel. Bring some books, come over, we’ll eat lunch and…ehhnn…do planning stuff, and you can head back in time to meet your repair person.”

“Well, that’s…that’s very kind of you—”

“Shaddaaaap. I’m not kind. I just don’t wanna be bored all day. I’ll see you in a bit—wait wait wait, don’t come right away—I gotta shower and—and stuff.”

“Relax, dear boy; I’ll be at least an hour. I have to gather the books I need, and…pick up some wine, or something of that nature.”

“Not complaining at all about you bringing wine, but just out of curiosity, is that because you can’t imagine being a guest at someone’s house without bringing a gift?”

Aziraphale glared at the telephone, which didn’t affect it at all. “Possibly.”

“Have I mentioned that you’re literally the most Southern Southerner ever?”

“At least five times since the New Year, I believe, dear.”

Crowley’s house was, well—

“Goodness gracious.”

Crowley rubbed the back of his neck. “You don’t like it.”

“No, no, I didn’t say that,” Aziraphale said. “It suits you.” Walking through Crowley’s door was like walking into an improbably electronic cave—slate-grey walls, recessed lighting, incomprehensible equipment installed like sleek stalactites. Aziraphale caught a glimpse of gleaming stainless steel in the kitchen before entering a living room—well, some sort of not-sleeping room, anyway—with an absurdly large television screen mounted on a wall, flanked by short pillars supporting rather brutal-looking sculpture pieces, and confronted by a couch that couldn’t possibly be comfortable. “I must admit that I expected more plants, though.”

“Plenty of plants—they’re through here,” Crowley said, crossing the room in that hip-swinging way he had (the lack of furniture gave him plenty of room to do it) and opening a door that had blended in with the wall, revealing a veritable jungle of glossy green foliage.

“Oh, _goodness_ ,” Aziraphale gasped. “Oh, Crowley, they’re _beautiful_.”

“They’d better be,” said Crowley, giving the plants a glare that would have successfully halted a ship crew’s mutiny. “Bathroom’s that way, if you need it”—he waved toward a hallway—“on the left before you get to the—nnngg—bedroom. I’ve got a…I dunno, sort of office through here”—he pushed open another doorway, where Aziraphale caught a glimpse of an empty desk, an oddly ornate chair, and shelves of neatly-placed Queen memorabilia—“but I figured we’d stay out here; more room.”

There was, indeed, plenty of room. Aziraphale avoided the couch (surely cushions shouldn’t be that square? Or have edges that looked like they might cut you if you relaxed?) and gingerly tried out a low-slung armchair. It proved to be unexpectedly squishy, considering that the seat looked like a leather-covered paving stone. Crowley sprawled across the couch, and didn’t sustain any obvious damage, though he did seem to gradually slide off of it over time, as if it were intent on subtly depositing him on the floor.

“How’s your graduate student settling in?” Aziraphale asked, applying Crowley’s corkscrew to the first of the wine he’d brought. Due to a departmental tradition he’d never learned the origin of, new graduate students took the Fall semester to “learn the department,” then chose their mentors starting in the Spring semester of their first year.

“Oh God, Newt,” Crowley groaned. “How does a millennial who claims to be interested in digital self-expression break literally every electronic device he touches? He blue-screened three separate systems last week; I’ve banned him from touching anything in my office. I swear I’m going to set him up with a typewriter. How’s yours doing? Student, not typewriter. Do you have a typewriter? Tell me you have a typewriter.”

“Anathema is…ah…she’s purifying my office, at the moment. She said some of my books have…inauspicious auras, can you imagine?”

“Purifying? Like with incense or something?” Crowley looked alarmed. (He’d left off his sunglasses, and, as usual when he did that, it was nice to be able to read his full expression.)

“No, not incense—she explained—well, I’m afraid I’ve never researched…ah…purification of any sort of auras, but she did mention that burning sage was culturally appropriative as well as environmentally irresponsible. I’m not sure about incense generally. In any case, she’s using ghost crystals that she dug herself, because apparently you can’t trust that store-bought crystals haven’t been acquired through exploitative labor.”

Crowley blinked slowly. “Ok, _one_ , what the fuck is a ghost crystal, and _B_ —errr—no— _two_ , isn’t crystal purification a little, errhfhgrh, new age-y for a good Baptist boy like you?”

“Oh, a ghost crystal is quartz that’s entirely clear. They’re quite remarkable. And I’m not sure Anathema would agree that it’s…’new age-y’…but in any event, setting the crystals around doesn’t do me any harm, and it _did_ make her happy. And they’re really very lovely, though I don’t suppose she’ll let me keep them permanently.”

“Maybe she can strap some to Newt and purify whatever it is that makes him keep frying technology,” said Crowley.

Image: Ghost crystals, which are pretty cool even if you don't believe in whatever Anathema believes in.

They might have accomplished some planning, possibly, at some point. There were certainly books and notebooks and electronic devices strewn across Crowley’s glass-and-steel coffee table by late afternoon, along with the wine glasses and takeout containers. They were in the midst of a discussion about groundhogs when Aziraphale glanced at his watch—

“Oh my!” He jumped to his feet. “I’ve nearly missed my appointment. I’ll see you Monday, dear.”

“Mmmm,” said Crowley, hefting himself back onto the couch from his most recent slow floorwards slide. “Don’t forget your Mary Poppins bag, angel.”

“Don’t be silly, Crowley; it’s not a Mary Poppins bag.”

“Wha’d’you call it, then?”

“It’s a valise, of course,” Aziraphale said, patting the smooth brown leather protectively.

“Oh, of course, a _valise_.” Crowley rolled his eyes. “Here, I’ll walk you out.”

He opened the door for Aziraphale with a mocking half-bow, and Aziraphale was visited, oddly, with an image of giving him a goodnight kiss on the cheek.

How absurd.

His heater was largely functional by Monday, and the semester proceeded as usual.

Or, not as usual.

Not as usual at all.

Having a graduate student to mentor, for example—that was new. He’d had mentees at Eastgate, but since starting at Tadfield, none of the entering graduate students had chosen him as an advisor (something that had come up as a concern during his tenure approval process). Anathema, therefore, was his first Tadfield mentee—although, admittedly, he felt at times as though he’d been given a manager rather than a student.

“I’ll need all the literature you have on Cassandra,” she stated, running critical eyes around his office bookshelves (reportedly now cleared of most of their problematic auras). “And we’ll need to order—” she rattled off a list of ancient prophetic works that made him think mournfully about the state of his efunds for the year. On the other hand, several of the items she listed were volumes he’d wanted the excuse to acquire for a while, so she didn’t have to exert much effort to convince him. (He thought she might have actually been disappointed about that.)

Speaking of students in offices, that was another difference: Undergraduates were actually coming to his office hours. The first time this happened, he spent a few seconds assuming the young people had gotten lost before he recognized them as the group from the second row of the Apocalypse class. The four of them somehow compressed themselves into his office, which hadn’t seen so many occupants in the three and a half years since Aziraphale had taken up residence. They asked questions—good ones, in fact—or, more specifically, the young woman (Pepper) and the curly-haired young man (Adam) did. The other two young men primarily served as backup, with frequent “actuallies” and snacking. They left with a translation of _Don Quixote_ that Aziraphale successfully unearthed from behind a set of French philosophers.

And then there was Warlock. He visited both Aziraphale and Crowley, shifting awkwardly in their doorways before admitting that he needed continued assistance navigating the various systems involved in securing academic accommodations without his parents’ knowledge. After that was accomplished, though, he simply…well…kept visiting.

“I feel like a…” Crowley said from the depths of Aziraphale’s couch on a Saturday evening, “…not a parent, but…eughrddhgh…”

“An advocate? Mentor?” Aziraphale suggested.

“Nnnmmmmghhh,” Crowley equivocated, waving a wine bottle to indicate that Aziraphale should continue impersonating a thesaurus.

“Guide? Tutor? Coach?”

“Nnnehh, not coach. Too sportsy. That’d be what his dad would want.”

“Excessively educated nanny.”

This produced an affronted glance from gold-tinted eyes. “I was _really_ trying not to say nanny.”

“Well, you should have mentioned that in your parameters.”

And, on the topic of overeducated nannying…

Over the past year or two, Aziraphale had gotten used to spending a half hour or so on Tuesday afternoons with Eve and a beginning reader book, giving Tracy a chance to finish up odds and ends. But these days, more often than not, Crowley would appear as well, joining them on the floor, upending reading practice with his unending variety of electronic applications.

It wasn’t a _bad_ change, necessarily, although it was…disconcerting. Aziraphale didn’t look too closely at _what_ , specifically, was disconcerting about it. It had something to do with how he felt when Crowley folded up his limbs to join them on the floor. Or when he made Eve giggle by doing poor imitations of Aziraphale’s reading voice. Whatever those feelings were, he stowed them in his mental file drawer that was not to be opened.

But all of those changes were, of course, simply skirting the real reason this semester was unusual.

 _That_ reason stared him in the face every Tuesday and Thursday morning.

He tried to ignore it for the first few weeks.

He dismissed it as the student groups presented modernizations of ancient tragedies that moved the class to tears or stunned silence. (Or laughter, in a few cases, but it made sense in context.)

He denied it as the class shifted from tragedies to comedies. He pretended he wasn’t thinking of it as he and Crowley showed the class bits of that lovely recent modernized version of _Much Ado About Nothing_. He ignored it, in fact, in the same way he was determinedly ignoring any thoughts of his and Crowley’s viewing of the play over the weekend. Well, _viewing_ was a fairly generous term; they’d spent most of the recording debating the attractiveness of a certain British actor.

_“He’s too skinny,” Crowley had said, frowning at his massive flat-screened device, where the actor in question was cavorting in tight denim shorts._

_Aziraphale had raised an eyebrow at Crowley’s practically shrink-wrapped limbs, dangling off his sharp-edged couch at unlikely angles. It was a view he’d developed a tolerance for, by now. Well, no, he hadn’t. But he’d at least developed a technique, allowing it to run on a side track rather than completely derailing his primary train of thought. “You’re hardly one to criticize someone for being skinny, dear boy.”_

_Crowley had snorted. “There’s skinny, and then there’s…” He’d waved a hand at the screen. “It’s like a special effect.” Then he’d tilted his head toward Aziraphale in sudden curiosity. “Is that your…type? Nnnnhhh…skinny?”_

_“Well, certainly not exclusively,” Aziraphale had replied, sitting more straightly in Crowley’s armchair and firmly turning his gaze toward the screen rather than any other…skinny types…who might happen to be in the vicinity. “I’m fairly certain I appreciate all body types. I’m only saying that he’s quite aesthetically pleasing.”_

_“_ Aesthetically pleasing _,” Crowley had echoed mockingly._

_“You don’t think so?”_

_“Mmmnnnhh, I didn’t say that. I just don't get the…eerrrrhh…the intensity of the appeal. He’s_ okaaay _, I guess. It’s just there’s plenty of others who’re”—he’d gestured into the middle distance, vaguely indicating a host of others—“just as aesthetically pleasing. Or more.”_

_“Is that so, dear? Who are your favorites?”_

_“Ehhhh, shut up and watch the play, angel.” Crowley had rolled over onto his front, somehow not falling off his couch in the process, and buried his face in his (skinny) elbows._

In any case, Aziraphale _wasn’t_ thinking of that, or of…of the thing he wasn’t thinking of. But by mid-semester, when the groups began presenting their comedic adaptations, his denial was hanging on by only a few threads, and after Warlock’s group presentation culminated in an actual food fight (to the class’s delight), he sat in his office afterward (with a salvaged piece of cake) and forced himself to face it:

The Apocalypse class was the most enjoyable teaching experience he’d had in years.

Which made sense, in a way, he told himself. He’d never co-taught before, after all. It wasn’t actually surprising that having someone else, a colleague, to…to collaborate with, to generate new ideas, would result in a more…invigorating experience. That was what colleagues were _for_ , really, given a minimum level of…compatibility.

It _was_ surprising, perhaps, that Aziraphale had managed to find that level of compatibility with Crowley, whose interests were so diametrically opposed to his, and who was his professional adversary (Aziraphale reminded himself, a bit tiredly).

But even that made a certain amount of sense, Aziraphale reasoned as the semester drew to a close, watching Adam and Pepper’s group perform their interpretation of _Don Quixote_ that brought several people to tears (although later Aziraphale had to stop Crowley from taking off points for excessive repetition of “Olé.” Or, possibly, Crowley had to stop Aziraphale). It was probably natural that such opposing interests would result in such…stimulation.

Of course, it was all temporary. The semester would end, both sides of the department would find some way to privately declare victory, and some other unfortunate souls would be assigned to teach the Apocalypse course next year.

And he and Crowley would no longer be co-teachers. They would move back into their expected roles as…rivals.

Which was…fine. Obviously it was fine. It was inevitable, and expected, and—and Aziraphale wasn’t thinking about it, not in particular.

He certainly wasn’t thinking about it in Tracy’s office on an afternoon in May as exams were drawing to an end, on his way to check his and Crowley’s mailboxes, when he nearly tripped over a table covered in small plants.

“Oh!” he said. “Hello, Eve. What have we here?”

“Save the monarchs!” Eve demanded.

Her table, now that he was taking in its full scope, boasted a poster in the shape of a large monarch butterfly, imploring “BE A BUTTERFLY HERO” in pre-cut letters.

“I see,” he said. “Ah—are they in danger?” He hadn’t kept up with insect-related news recently other than the general ominous warnings about threats to pollinators, and besides, Eve clearly had a lecture prepared and was waiting for the chance to bestow it upon someone.

“Humans are destroying their habitat,” she began, and launched into an explanation of her second-grade class’s spring project, which included starting plants from seeds in their classroom window, a charitable foundation centered around monarch butterflies, and an extensive description of butterfly migration patterns. Aziraphale wasn’t entirely sure he followed all of the details, but he gathered that, in order to ensure monarch survival: 1) Humans must grow a plant called milkweed in every possible location, and 2) He, personally, must purchase one of the tiny milkweed plants on her table.

Below (content warning, bugs): Pictures Eve might have had in her display, including photos of a monarch caterpillar and a monarch butterfly on milkweed plants.

Images: A monarch caterpillar eating milkweed; a monarch butterfly visiting milkweed, probably to lay eggs.

Rescuing the monarch butterfly population seemed like a rather overwhelming amount of responsibility for someone who’d never kept a plant alive in his life, but nonetheless, as Aziraphale walked down the hallway a few minutes later, he found himself the dubiously proud owner of a biodegradable pot containing a two-inch stem with a few slender leaves.

It wasn’t until he was back in his office that it occurred to him that he could have simply made a donation to the butterfly-related foundation and left the plants to go to homes better versed in gardening competence. _That would have been a wiser choice_ , he thought as he placed the plant carefully on his windowsill. _It certainly can’t stay here in my office_ , he thought as he kept an eye on it over the next few days. That would defeat the entire purpose of growing it for butterfly use. _I should take it home_ , he thought as he glanced at it warily while grading final papers. _It’s entirely possible that it could grow well in my yard_ , he thought as he looked at an email from Tracy to the full department, featuring Crowley’s name and sparkling unicorns holding rainbow birthday cakes.

 _They’re supposed to be hardy plants_ , he thought as he carried it gingerly out of his office. _I could probably keep it alive with some basic care_.

And he was in the doorway of Crowley’s office, knocking softly on the open door. The plant, for some reason, was tucked behind his back.

“Happy birthday, my dear,” he said.

Crowley’s eyebrows arched up, then knitted together as he sent a scowl at his computer screen, where the birthday email was no doubt lurking. “You noticed that, huh.”

“It’s a bit hard to miss,” admitted Aziraphale, not mentioning that he’d found out Crowley’s birthdate (May 10) from Tracy back in October, when Crowley had given him his weather rock.

“Yeah…well…mrrrggghhh…thanks, I guess.”

“I—I did think—well, I was wondering,” Aziraphale said, and now the plant was in front of him, “it’s only that Eve was selling these, as, as a fundraiser, and I purchased one, and I thought you might…enjoy it.”

Crowley stared at the plant, then looked at Aziraphale, the visible parts of his face blank.

“You got me a birthday present?”

“Ah, well, it’s just a favor to Eve, really,” said Aziraphale, certain he had overstepped, “I—I thought of you because, because of plants, but you don’t have to keep it; I can give it a go myself if you don’t want—”

“Angel—Aziraphale— _Aziraphale_ —shut up—course I want—here.” He’d risen and swung his hips around his desk, and his long fingers delicately took the tiny plant in its tiny biodegradable pot from Aziraphale’s plant-unfriendly hands.

“You don’t have to take it just to be polite, dear.”

Crowley’s eyebrows shot back up. “I’m _not_ polite. I’m never polite. I like the damn plant.”

“Oh—oh good. I know your plants are generally indoor plants, so I—I wasn’t sure.”

“No, no, it’s perfect. I hadn’t started an outdoor garden yet, because, ennnhhhh, and this’ll be—this’ll make a good starting point.”

By the time Aziraphale left, Crowley was holding the plant at eye level (well, sunglasses level, for him), inspecting it—or possibly terrorizing it—from several angles, muttering about pots and soil types and sun requirements. Aziraphale returned to his office with his heart certainly not fluttering at the memory of Crowley’s almost-hidden smile as he held his gift. And as he packed his books into his valise and left campus, he was not thinking, _definitely_ not thinking of the brush of Crowley’s fingers against his as he’d taken the tiny pot.

Image: What Crowley's milkweed will look like by the end of the summer, if it knows what's good for it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies that this half-chapter took so long! My real-life duties became fairly time-consuming for a while (nothing bad, just lots of things)! I hope to move through the next one more quickly; it's got some parts I'm excited to get out there!
> 
> Saving the monarchs is a real thing; you can find out more at a variety of sites, such as the [Save Our Monarchs Foundation.](https://www.saveourmonarchs.org)


	8. Oysters and Chocolates

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yes, THOSE oysters and THOSE chocolates. We start to earn our E rating here, but you can skip that section if that's not your thing! (And no, they don't get together yet. We're also earning our slow burn tag!)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To skip the E-rated bit, when you get to "He’d already had a shower today, but it was hot out, or whatever," skip down a couple of paragraphs to: "But as he came down from his…his high?"

Crowley stared at his bedroom ceiling.

As entertainment choices went, it was a very poor one.

There had been a time in his life—the entire 41-year stretch of it, in fact—when a Saturday with nothing scheduled had been a cause for celebration. Twenty-four hours of freedom to sleep however much he wanted, cause whatever trouble he liked, listen to music as loud as he damn well pleased, watch a Golden Girls marathon for however long he fucking desired.

So why the Hell was he stretched on his bed, contemplating his ceiling, at—he flopped his head sideways to glare at his clock—ten in the morning?

Why the Hell was he even awake at ten on a Saturday morning?

He groaned and rubbed his face. It was the week he’d had, he decided. Of course he’d be drained after that shithole of a week. That didn’t explain the “awake at 10am” thing, but he wasn’t responsible for explaining everything. It definitely didn’t have anything to do with the fact that this was the fourth Saturday that he hadn’t needed to grab a bottle of wine and head out for a planning session for—no, fuck that train of thought. He wasn’t _bored_ without Aziraphale’s company; he was a grown-ass man and could damn well entertain himself alone.

Or, if “entertain himself” was too high a bar, he could at least mope about his summer term course assignment alone.

He’d had to ask Aziraphale to explain the course to him in the first place, back sometime in the spring, after B had flatly informed him he’d be teaching it.

_“What_ is _the Down South campus, and what is the Basics course, and why did Hastur and Ligur laugh when B said I’d be teaching it in Summer 1?”_

_“Ah,” Aziraphale had said. It was never a good sign when he said “Ah” in that particular tone of sympathy. “I was hoping they wouldn’t give you that course in your first year. They do tend to rotate it around through the newest faculty—I had it two years ago, and Arthur Young had it last year.”_

_“So, what’s…mmmnnnhh…the problem with it, then?”_

_“It’s—well, first of all, the Down South campus—or, officially, the South Extension Campus. It’s a small satellite campus to the south of Tadfield—”_

_“I’d gotten that much, yeah.”_

_“Oh, hush. There’s the commute, first of all. The campus is in an absolutely lovely area, deeper into the foothills than we are here, but it’s about 45 minutes away, on the other side of Devil’s Dyke—well, 45 minutes for a reasonably normal driver, I suppose.” Aziraphale had given Crowley that very dry side glance. “And then, the course itself…” Aziraphale had sighed. “It’s called Introduction to the Basics of Literature, and it’s not technically a remedial course, but it essentially functions as one. The students at the Down South campus tend to have a…ah…a number of educational barriers in their lives. The course was Mac’s idea, and I’m certain it’s a good idea in principle. There’s a pre-set curriculum, which is supposed to relieve some of the preparation burden from faculty, and I suppose it does, but…”_

But Crowley had never met a pre-set curriculum that he didn’t want to consign to the fires of Hell.

Currently, after his first week of the class, he thought he might prefer diving into the fires of Hell himself rather than return to teaching it on Monday.

It might not have been so bad if he’d had Azir—

“Oh, balls,” he muttered, dragged himself into the shower, pulled on something black (not that he had any other colors available), and drove to Mort’s.

He stopped the Bentley in front of the brewery and gaped.

“What the _Hell_?”

At 11am on a Saturday, Mort’s parking lot was packed. That had never happened at any point in the history of…of Crowley’s less than one year of coming to Mort’s. Was the brewery having a…celebrity guest? There _was_ a banner over the entrance that read “The Awakening: Introducing the Afterlife.” Maybe it was a death-obsessed band.

The inside of Mort’s was even more packed than the parking lot, and nearly as uncomfortably warm as the outdoor June heat. There was no sign of a band (or any other death-heralding celebrity), although Crowley could see fragments of possibly ominous posters plastering the walls as he struggled through the crowd.

He finally reached the bar, feeling battered. This was not remotely what he’d had in mind for his unstructured Saturday.

It took an unacceptably long time to catch a bartender’s attention. “What have you got on—”

“Hi,” said the bartender, in the voice of someone who has been saying the same phrase for long enough that the words have ceased to have meaning and have become a collection of random syllables, “which beverage from Leave Before the Rush Breweries’ new Afterlife series would you like to try today?”

A new drink series. Huh. That explained the crowd, as well as the wall-covering posters—once Crowley had gotten a full view of them, he’d noted that they proclaimed options like Asphodel, Gehenna, Jahannam, and Limbo. He’d begun vaguely wondering if Mort was starting a cult.

Crowley glowered at the waiting bartender. She glowered back.

He broke first.

“Just give me something drinkable,” he mumbled. Decision-making was beyond him at the moment. She gave him a look that would probably have been scornful if it had had the energy, and poured him something very pale that was evidently called The Astral Plane. It looked appalling.

He was bracing himself to taste it when his eye was caught by a familiar set of white-blond curls (that he hadn’t seen in nearly a month, not that he was counting) weaving through the throngs to his right—

“Crowley?” Aziraphale asked, as if the sight of Crowley in a bar was something unexpected. “Well! Fancy running into _you_ , here!”

As if they hadn’t been coming together to Mort’s for nearly a year now.

“Still a professor, then?” Aziraphale went on.

Something snapped. “What the Hell kind of a stupid question is that, ‘Still a professor?’” Crowley demanded. “What else am I gonna be, an aardvark?”

This succeeded in making Aziraphale…raise his eyebrows. Mildly. “Salut,” he said (also mildly), lifting his glass to Crowley.

Crowley sighed, clinked his glass against Aziraphale’s, and took a sip of Astral Plane.

And nearly spat it out. “Shit, what _is_ this?”

“Oh dear,” said Aziraphale, sympathetically. “I suppose there were bound to be some options that are less than ideal. Here, try mine.” And he switched their glasses before Crowley realized what he was doing, and took a sip of what had been Crowley’s drink. “Ah,” he said, his eyebrows rising painfully. “Yes, that’s a bit…crisp.”

Crowley had missed those eyebrows. How the Hell could you miss _eyebrows_? He tried a taste of Aziraphale’s drink to distract himself.

“Well, this one’s fine,” he said, somehow annoyed about it. “What’s this one?”

“Third Circle,” said Aziraphale brightly. “I quite like it.” He tried the Astral Plane again, gave a refined sort of shiver, and set it down firmly on the bar. “Were you planning to stay long at the Awakening?”

“Didn’t even know about it,” Crowley grumbled. He was _not_ going to be cheered up by small talk. “Just nipped in for a bit of day drinking. You?”

“I wanted to be supportive of Mort, of course,” Aziraphale said. “He’s been working on this new line for ages. But”—he glanced around and lowered his voice as if the bar staff might hear, or care—“I was planning to slip away to try a new restaurant for lunch. It’s called Pete’s Place, over in Rome. I hear he does remarkable things to oysters.”

“I’ve never eaten an oyster,” Crowley frowned, absolutely not affected by the sunshine glow of Aziraphale anticipating a new restaurant. He took another sip of Third Circle. “Pretty sure they’re supposed to be sinful.”

“ _Oh_ ,” said Aziraphale, and Crowley could _feel_ his eyes widening even though he wasn’t looking at him, “well, in that case, let me tempt you into sin.”

Crowley turned to face him, feeling his own eyebrows climbing his forehead. Aziraphale broke off and—and smirked. That was a _smirk_.

“Oh,” Aziraphale said. “No, I suppose that’s your job, isn’t it?” He didn’t quite wink, but he certainly twinkled in a way that suggested it.

Crowley couldn’t resist any more: He broke into a smile.

They escaped to the parking lot, which was an improvement in that it was crowded only with heat-shimmering cars instead of loudly-mingling humans, but which also gave Crowley his first full view of Aziraphale—summertime Saturday Aziraphale, apparently. His powder-blue shirt was still a long-sleeved button-up, but he’d left off the waistcoat _and_ the bowtie, and the top button was unbuttoned, revealing that miniscule white triangle of undershirt that Crowley had _not_ been thinking about since last fall. The collective body heat in Mort’s had been enough that Aziraphale’s forehead glistened, and his blond hair was the tiniest bit damp, and—had he gotten a haircut? Not that it _mattered_ , not that Crowley was thinking about Aziraphale leaning back in a barber’s chair for a wash—

“Did you get a haircut, dear?” Aziraphale asked, his eyes on Crowley’s hair (which he’d styled this morning by half-heartedly running his fingers through it a couple of times with some mousse after his shower).

“Ecknnnck—yyeah, yeah, I did. Last week. Couple of weeks ago, I dunno. For the summer or whatever.”

“It looks very nice. Very appropriate for summer.”

“Mmmnnehh,” Crowley managed, running a hand through it and probably destroying whatever little semblance of style it had, “uhh, thanks. Um. Did you? Get a haircut?”

“I did, yes,” said Aziraphale, with a satisfied little wiggle and that flick of a glance up through his eyelashes.

“It, uh, it looks.” Crowley waved at it, nodding like a bobble-head toy, probably. “It looks good.”

“Oh, thank you,” Aziraphale replied, and the smile he shone on Crowley was the glowing one, and Crowley forgot about the heat, and Astral Plane Ale, and the Down South campus, and overfull parking areas.

He also forgot to walk to his car.

“Where are you parked, dear?” Aziraphale’s voice broke into his stupor. Crowley blinked and forced his eyes back into focus, unfortunately landing on Aziraphale’s faded blue abomination of a “car.”

“Erk,” Crowley said, gesturing in a random direction. “Over there.”

“I can drive, if you—”

“No no no no,” Crowley interrupted, abruptly more alert, “I am _not_ riding all the way over to Rome in that—that—”

“It’s a perfectly functional car, Crowley, and you’ve been commuting all week; I thought you’d like a rest—”

“I _like_ driving. The driving is the only not-bad thing about this week.”

“Oh, very well; you can follow me home, and we’ll drop off my car—”

“ _No_ , I won’t _follow_ you home; I’ll _meet_ you at your house, because you’ll take that back road of _death_ —”

“It’s just a _hill_ , Crowley—”

“A hill of _death_ , with a goddamn _lake_ at the bottom, and then that fucking _dirt road_ —”

“It’s not dirt; it’s—well, it’s gravel, but—”

“That’s _not_ better, and I’m _not_ taking the Bentley on it. Or anywhere near that hill. I don’t know how your brakes haven’t given out.”

“For Heaven’s sake, Crowley, it’s not nearly that steep. And the view from the top of the hill is simply _lovely_.”

“Lovely before you plunge down into the lake of death.”

“I’ll see you at my house, dear boy.”

The most annoying part about Aziraphale’s back route was that it defeated Crowley’s plan to be waiting impatiently in Aziraphale’s driveway by the time Aziraphale came trundling up the road. Instead, Crowley pulled up to find Aziraphale’s car already hidden away in his garage, and Aziraphale himself cheerfully emerging from his front door.

“I got caught by _three_ red lights,” Crowley growled once he and Aziraphale were ensconced in the Bentley, winding around the Tadfield streets that would eventually get them out of town heading northeast. “Three! With people in front of me actually _waiting_ for the light to change. Why does Tadfield even use red lights on a Saturday?”

“Probably to stop people like you from hitting pedestrians. And in any case, that’s why I use my shortcut—no red lights at all on that route,” Aziraphale replied, with a sanctimonious smile that lasted until—“Crowley, you can’t just drive straight through the stop sign!”

“Pff, there’s nobody there. Why waste gas with the whole full stop thing? Not everyone’s gotta come to a full 5-second stop like you do, angel. I bet you still do the S-T-O-P thing in your head to make sure you stop long enough.”

“Oh, hush. How was your first week with the Basics class?”

Crowley let out a string of profanities. “How—most pointless—how’m I supposed to—ok, first of all, those students don’t need the basics of literature—well, eeuurgh, they _do_ , but what they really need is a damn basic income.”

“Yes—watch the road, Crowley!—yes, I agree with you, dear.”

“I _am_ watching the road,” Crowley frowned in Aziraphale’s direction. “And—and child care. They need fucking child care—I had to hold someone’s baby on Thursday when we had our first quiz.”

“Did you, now.” Aziraphale’s voice deepened to something smiling and fond in a way that made Crowley suddenly find it worthwhile to keep his eyes on the road.

“And speaking of that quiz,” he went on, imagining his gaze burning a hole through his windshield, “what the _Hell_ is that curriculum? Who came up with that shit?”

Aziraphale sighed. “It was before I started here, but if I’ve heard correctly, Dagon wrote it originally, and then the Literature side, ah, pointed out that they—we—should have a hand in it, and so Sandy…did some editing.”

“That explains a lot.”

“Crowley, keep your hands on the wheel!”

The very ambitiously named Rome, Tennessee, was about a 15-minute drive from Tadfield (for Crowley). It boasted a total of two stoplights and a “business district,” housed in approximately four buildings, which now included a restaurant called Pete’s Place. It might have been called a fusion restaurant, if it had been built in a location where restaurants were called fusion restaurants. As it was, Crowley suspected that the combination of Italian and Cajun styles was more a result of whatever Pete (assuming he existed) happened to prefer to cook.

Which, evidently, included oysters.

Crowley eyed the…things…apprehensively. They’d arrived nestled in a bed of ice on a platter, accompanied by a number of lemons sliced in half and little cups of house-made cocktail sauce.

Aziraphale, in contrast, was eyeing them with an eagerness that bordered on indecent. “I’ll show you how to manage them, dear boy; don’t worry,” he said, picking up a tiny fork.

And he certainly did.

It had been nearly a month since Crowley had eaten with Aziraphale (the last time had been while grading the final projects for the Apocalypse course, when Crowley had had to stop Aziraphale from taking off points from Adam and Pepper’s group for excessive use of “Olé.” Or possibly Aziraphale had stopped _him_ ; he couldn’t remember). Maybe in that time he’d forgotten the…impact…of Aziraphale’s food-enjoyment noises.

Or maybe oysters produced more…impactful…noises.

Or maybe it was the way Aziraphale’s lips delicately slurped down the contents of the shell. How anyone could slurp delicately was beyond Crowley, but Aziraphale managed it.

Or maybe it was the way his whole neck was visible, thanks to the summertime Saturday state of unbuttonedness, so Crowley had a full view as he tipped his head back to slide the liquid and meat from the shell into his mouth, the muscles in his throat visibly swallowing it down—

Crowley took a slow, quiet breath and stared at a lemon.

“Are you ready to give it a try, dear?”

“Ngk!” said Crowley. “R-right. Try. Yep, sure.”

Aziraphale was explaining about the different flavoring options, testing the cocktail sauce by dipping the tines of his miniature fork into one of the cups, and how were his lips so damned _perfect_?

And _then_ he took the lemon that had been Crowley’s security lemon, and squeezed it, and his hands were broad and capable, and his blunt nails were neatly manicured, maybe _recently_ manicured, and Crowley wondered wistfully if Aziraphale had had a self-care day after the semester had ended, and—

“Try the lemon first,” said Aziraphale, handing Crowley the oyster he’d just masterfully spritzed.

“Huh?” said Crowley. “Oherrr…yeah. Lemon flavor first. Here goes.”

He went through all the motions with the fork and the shell that Aziraphale had gone through, though far less competently. Aziraphale watched him in the way that you watch someone when you’ve handed them your favorite book to read.

Crowley chewed. Crowley swallowed.

He met Aziraphale’s anticipatory gaze. (That tremulous eyebrow lift, _fuck_.)

“I don’t hate them,” Crowley said, “so let’s start there.”

Aziraphale relaxed into a hopeful smile. “We’ll try them with the cocktail sauce next.”

They took turns with a few more before Crowley declared himself full and let Aziraphale finish off the platter. Well, _watched_ Aziraphale finish off the platter, to be fully accurate. He hoped his inability to look away was obscured by his sunglasses and his sporadic sips of the serviceable dry white they’d ordered.

The conversation moved away from oysters quickly, thank—thank anything. Unfortunately, they somehow landed next on the Basics course, which was the opposite of what Crowley wanted to talk or think about.

Except that—

“I must admit,” Aziraphale said, his eyes darting around as if someone in Pete’s Place in Rome, Tennessee, might overhear him and report back to Gabriel, “that when I taught it, I did…take a few liberties with the material. All within the bounds of the curriculum, of course. Ah…generally speaking.”

Crowley sat up on his side of the booth. “Did you, now.”

“Well, after the first quiz was a bit…disastrous,” Aziraphale said, “I couldn’t help but notice that all of the literature choices were rather…homogeneous.”

“As in, white, male, and dead for at least a century?” Crowley replied. “And who write in sentences with the structure of a damn garden hose? Fucking Tennyson, and Byron, and…eeuuurrrrggghh, it makes so much more sense now I know Sandy was involved.”

“Ah…well…I suppose not _all_ male; there is some Dickinson included—”

“She’s not any better,” Crowley snapped. “Well, herrrrggghh, ok, she _is_ better, but she’s not any less convoluted. I bet Sandy put her in for ‘diversity.’”

Aziraphale sighed. “Most likely.” He looked at his watch and surveyed the remains of their lunch. “Are you finished eating, dear? I could show you some of the…ah… _tweaks_ I made, if you don’t mind stopping by my place for a little while.”

Crowley heroically contained his reaction at being asked if he _minded_ spending time at Aziraphale’s house.

Some time later, well-settled in Aziraphale’s living room, they had moved on from Dickinson, had definitely touched on Sappho at some point, and had gotten to animals who had held public office, when Aziraphale frowned guiltily and glanced at the clock.

“I do apologize, dear boy; you did come by for a reason, after all. Ah—let me find—” He disappeared around the corner of a packed bookcase or two and reemerged after a while, blowing dust from a binder painstakingly labeled with the full name of the Basics course, in his antiquated cursive.

“A good deal of what I implemented isn’t exactly in written form,” he said, opening the binder anyway (on top of the layer of books that had reclaimed his coffee table since Crowley had seen it last). “But in any case, given that the course is an introduction to the _basics_ of literature, I thought it would be in keeping with the…well, the _spirit_ of the course to ensure that the students learned about…basic resources that help one engage with literature.”

Crowley frowned, translating. “You mean you told them about Cliffs Notes?”

“Among other things, yes. That sort of…ah…study aide has expanded a great deal since we were students, you know. I—that is—of course you know. And naturally, some of the students knew more about the various options than I did, so it was educational for me as well. And it turns out that the library at the Down South campus, while small, has a few staff members who are very pleased—thrilled, really—to be able to instruct students in the resources _they_ have available. One gets the impression that they perhaps don’t see much traffic, ordinarily.” Aziraphale’s eyes widened at the idea that anyone might voluntarily avoid a library.

“So…you took the class on a field trip to the library,” Crowley summarized.

Aziraphale huffed. “Well, if you _must_ describe it that way, I suppose so.”

Crowley grinned, visualizing Aziraphale leading a crew of bored undergraduates across campus like a brood of ducklings.

Although it still didn’t explain—

“Wait, how’d you get them through those shitty-ass quizzes? I mean, nnnhhhh, I’m all for learning about resources, but it’s not gonna tell them how to ‘identify the example of personification in this passage’ or whatever the fuck, when they’d need a degree in sentence diagramming to have the first clue what the passage was even talking about. I swear, I’ve never been so pissed off at Robert Frost in my life.”

“Yes, I’m afraid I must agree with you that the quizzes and exams are…not the best metric of actual learning. And unfortunately, as you know, we can’t alter those. After some thought”— Aziraphale’s voice was suspiciously smooth—“I concluded that the students might benefit if I added some slides to the lectures that targeted some of the…ah…more challenging test items. Here, my dear—let me show you an example.” He turned to his clunky home desktop—which continually surprised Crowley by continuing to function, as well as by not being buried in a landslide of the books surrounding it (a bookslide?). Aziraphale minimized a weather map or two and navigated through an absurdly long series of subfolders, until he reached one labeled “LITA 103 Introduction to the Basics of Literature Summer 1 Power Points Modified,” with a date from two years ago.

The slide he (eventually) pulled up was titled “Personification” and showed a poetry excerpt with a few words highlighted. Crowley glanced at it and then did a double-take, reading it again, more thoroughly.

“Angel,” he said slowly, “that’s the actual test question. With the answer highlighted.”

Aziraphale turned to him, his eyes wide, and innocent as the day (they were blue today, matching his shirt). “Obviously, dear, if the passage is important enough to be included on the quiz, it ought to be included in the course materials.”

“ _Angel_ ,” Crowley repeated. “You devious bastard. All this time I’ve thought _I’ve_ been corrupting _you_.”

Crowley wondered whether anyone else would have seen the very slight wicked touch to Aziraphale’s smile, or spotted his just-perceptible wiggle. Certainly not Gabriel, for instance.

They went through a few more slides before it was Crowley’s turn to look at his watch. “Order dinner?” he suggested.

“Oh, I can’t, dear; I’m sorry. I have a church thing.”

“Right, right,” said Crowley, probably keeping his face from falling. “Um…can you send me…ehhhh…whatever materials you want to? Orrrr, we could…could we meet again? Another working lunch, next Saturday?”

Aziraphale agreed to both, with a warm smile that Crowley filed away, in his drawer for those. He told himself that he didn’t have any business feeling disappointed at being sent home; all of today had been a bonus, so much better than he’d expected when he’d lain glaring at his bedroom ceiling this morning.

He kept telling himself that, all the way back home in the Bentley, all the way past Aziraphale’s milkweed on his front porch (thriving in a large pot), all the way to his bed where he flopped down again. Likely a stupid move, that—he had no desire for another round of ceiling glaring. Plenty of other things to do, probably.

He pulled out his phone and looked at his calendar, for no reason that he could think of, until he found himself counting days. Sunday tomorrow, in all its emptiness (and all its avoidance of thinking of Aziraphale in choir robes, rumbling the bass line of a gospel chorus). Five days of the Basics course, now made slightly less intolerable, thanks to Aziraphale’s materials. And then Saturday again, glowing like a damn sunrise with its promise of another lunch with Aziraphale.

And then his mind was back at Pete’s Place; he was watching Aziraphale’s naked throat swallowing, watching those perfect pink lips sucking down the contents of an oyster shell, hearing that indecent moan as he took in the flavor.

Shit. Shit shit shit.

Ok. The bed was a bad idea. He could take a shower or something. He’d already had a shower today, but it was hot out, or whatever. 

The shower was _not_ better. Why had he thought that going somewhere _more_ naked and _more_ private would be better?

In public, he’d been able to shove the most inappropriate of his thoughts away, as he had been for the past year, pretending he didn’t know exactly where he was imagining those lips, exactly how he wanted to hear that moan, exactly what he wanted that throat to swallow down.

Now here he was, warm water flowing down his bare skin, with precisely no barriers between himself and—and—

“Aaagghhh,” he groaned. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” He _couldn’t_ do this, not with Aziraphale—Aziraphale was his _friend_ , his _colleague_ ; their relationship was _professional_ —and he, Crowley, didn’t give a shit about all the various rules that stood between them, but Aziraphale _did_. Aziraphale hadn’t consented to this, would never want anything like this; it wasn’t fair to him—

 _Aziraphale isn’t here_ , his brain (or some part of his anatomy) pointed out. Crowley wasn’t doing anything at all to actual-Aziraphale. Imagining moans and lips and a throat wasn’t anything Aziraphale-specific.

Besides, obviously any Aziraphale who would have sex with Crowley _wasn’t_ the real Aziraphale. If Crowley was only imagining some…imaginary person…that didn’t breach anything, did it?

A loophole. The real Aziraphale would appreciate that, in some alternate universe, that would never exist, in which Crowley could conceivably ever tell him about it.

“Oh, fuck it,” Crowley muttered, and took himself in hand.

He was well on his way to full hardness already. He moved slowly at first, imagining pink lips, beautifully formed—but not belonging to any specific person—stretched around his cock, lusciously. Then he went harder, bracing his free hand against the dark tile wall, picturing a throat clenching as he—the non-specific person—took in his full length, swallowing around him as if Crowley were something to be enjoyed.

He stroked faster; he had the right rhythm and the right angle now, arousal building like a train that couldn’t be stopped, and his brain supplied an image of blond hair curling damply as water streamed around them both, delicate eyelids fluttering shut with pleasure, sensual moans vibrating around Crowley and cutting straight to his core—

“Shit, shit, _shit_!” Crowley gasped, and came.

After he was done, he stood for a few minutes under the shower spray, both hands on the wall now, letting the water run freely down his body, carrying away the evidence of his...activity…as if it had never happened. As he floated vaguely earthwards, he wondered if he would soon wish for his memory of the incident to be washed away just as easily.

He found that he felt oddly neutral about that. He hadn’t hurt anyone (and he’d been recovered from the “masturbation is of the devil” bullshit from his upbringing for decades now). And he’d kept real-Aziraphale out of it as best he could.

But as he came down from his…his high? Whatever it was called when you got all worked up and then climaxed and then went back to normal. Anyway, as he came back to ordinary reality, imaginary-Aziraphale faded, and real-Aziraphale barged back into Crowley’s mind—well, no; Aziraphale wouldn’t _barge_. Real-Aziraphale knocked politely but insistently, rather, and made his way back into Crowley’s mind with a nervous smile.

Real Aziraphale, who wore bowties and layers, and made horrible jokes, and complained about Crowley’s driving, and was earth-shatteringly kind, and was heartbreakingly grateful at even the smallest kindness shown to him—

Crowley didn’t want to have sex with that Aziraphale—no, scratch that, he _absolutely did_ , but he wanted so much more than that. He wanted to bring him gifts and make him smile and watch him eat and tell him he was fucking astonishing, so he could start forgetting the shit that people like Gabriel kept programming into him, and…and fucking _Hell_.

Crowley paused in the middle of drying off, taking in a long breath. His eyes sort of…failed to focus on anything.

He’d known he was in deep, but he hadn’t realized he was in _that_ deep.

“Ah, shit,” he said to his unsympathetic bedroom. “Sorry, angel.”

* * *

Aziraphale stared in horror at his unsympathetic computer.

There had to be a mistake.

He read the surely-mistaken email again. It was certainly from Gabriel, no denying that. The subject line, “ _Unexpected opportunity for you!_ ” was authentic Gabriel (it was Gabriel’s third-worst subject line, in terms of its effect on Aziraphale’s heartrate).

But Gabriel _had_ to have meant it for someone else.

Admittedly, the fact that it began “ _Hello Aziraphale!_ ” (Gabriel’s fourth-worst salutation) was evidence against that conclusion.

But…

Aziraphale read through it again. Maybe _he_ had misinterpreted it.

Unfortunately, the scant few sentences didn’t lend themselves to much interpretation at all, incorrect or otherwise.

“ _Uri can’t teach the Basics course for Summer 2—family emergency_ ,” it read. “ _You’re next in the rotation on our side, so that means you get to fill in! Terrific bonus for you!_ ”

Aziraphale stared at the words that were cheerfully shredding his summer plans into sad, forsaken tatters. He’d been looking forward to a relatively relaxing summer, his first one as a tenured professor. His Summer 1 course (Graduate Seminar in Antiquarian Roman Poetry) was one of his favorites—nobody took a summer seminar in antiquarian Roman poetry unless they truly enjoyed the classics, so the class contained a total of four graduate students, one of whom was Anathema. And for the second half of the summer—his glorious stretch of free time—he’d planned some small excursions, nothing major, but he _had_ been particularly looking forward to the week-long Taste of Appalachia tour he’d discovered.

If someone were to devise the exact opposite of “a relaxing summer for Aziraphale,” the Basics course would be precisely what they would create.

He’d _discussed_ his summer teaching plan with Gabriel—had Gabriel forgotten?

Aziraphale looked past his computer to his office door and tugged at his lapels. He would simply have to go speak with Gabriel and—and straighten this out.

Gabriel was staring avidly at his own computer, typing away, when Aziraphale knocked softly on his open door.

“Hi there, Aziraphale, give me just a second,” Gabriel said brightly, holding up one finger, his eyes already back on his screen. He typed for several more seconds. Aziraphale focused on standing still instead of rocking from foot to foot.

“There we go,” said Gabriel with satisfaction. “Just firing off an email to the Academic Senate about their policy change proposal. Honestly, I don’t know what they’re thinking—it would undermine the whole point of tenure. One bad performance review, and even a tenured full professor could be fired. That defeats the whole purpose; don’t you agree? So I’m sending them a strongly-worded note.” He nodded firmly, then steepled his fingers together and looked up at Aziraphale. “Now, what can I do for you? I’m glad you stopped by—you know my open-door policy!” His smile was at full wattage.

Aziraphale laced his fingers together in front of his waistcoat and tried not to feel like a child standing in the school principal’s office. “I—ah, well, I just received your email about—about teaching the Basics course in Summer 2, and I wondered if there was possibly a mistake.”

“A mistake?” Gabriel’s eyebrows arched in a way that had the exact opposite effect of the same motion from Crowley. “Haha, you know me better than that, Aziraphale! I wouldn’t make a mistake like that! No, I definitely picked you, and I’m sure it’s the right choice.”

“Yes, I—I see. It—it’s just that I _wasn’t_ scheduled to teach Summer 2 this year. In fact, I had specifically planned to teach Summer 1 and not Summer 2.”

“That’s true, but as soon as Uri let me know they couldn’t do it after all, I knew you were the one who would get the chance!” Gabriel beamed in a way that reminded Aziraphale of visits to the dentist. “After all, you just taught it two years ago, and of course the curriculum is already written—it’s basically no work! And it’s more pay, and another line on your CV! What more could you ask for?”

Aziraphale could think of several things he could ask for, chief among them his vacation that he’d been looking forward to.

…Except that he _couldn’t_ ask for that.

“I—ah—of course,” he said, crumpling. “You’re quite right. It—it’s an excellent opportunity.” He was fairly certain that the expression he was forcing onto his face resembled a smile. It couldn’t possibly be convincing, but Gabriel wasn’t looking at him anyway.

“Was that everything? Really, Aziraphale, you could have just sent an email to clear that up. Well, have a good weekend!”

Aziraphale managed to stammer out something that sounded like “You as well” before retreating to his office and closing the door. Quietly. He walked slowly to his chair and sat.

He found himself lifting his phone and dialing before he realized what he was doing.

“Hello,” he said when Crowley answered, “it—it’s me, Aziraphale.”

“I know it’s—angel, are you ok?”

“Oh, Crowley, I’m so—”

And he spilled the story, spilled more than he’d meant to, somehow—“And I know Gabriel has our best interests at heart, but he—oh, I don’t know; I suppose he doesn’t _think_ when he makes these assignments, these…demands—of course he sees it as a professional opportunity; he wouldn’t imagine someone preferring to do…well…nothing, instead of having a chance to, to advance—”

“But, angel—you mean he just told you that you had to teach it? When you weren’t supposed to be teaching Summer 2 this year? He—he can’t _do_ that!” Crowley’s voice crackled furiously through the phone.

Aziraphale sighed. “He can, though. He’s my department chair. It’s his job to—to give us assignments.”

“But he—he’s not respecting—that’s bullshit.”

Aziraphale had had this conversation before. Not with Crowley, not yet, but with countless others, and he could already hear the words echoing in his head, telling him that he needed to stand up for himself, stop being so…so soft—

“Oh, Crowley, you can’t fix this by being angry at it,” he said, tiredly, to head that off. “Let’s…let’s have lunch, if you haven’t already. If I’m teaching the course again, it will help to…to discuss what worked best from my materials, and what you’d recommend changing.”

“Sure, sure, yeah, yeah,” said Crowley. Aziraphale could picture him nodding rapidly. It was inexplicably soothing. “Lunch is great. I just gotta drive up from Down South, I just got out of class. Uhhhh, I can call you when I get close, innnn…twenty-ish minutes? Will you still be in your office?”

“Yes—ah—no.” Aziraphale was seized with an intense urge to leave the Literature and Language Arts building. “You can call my cellular phone.”

“Your _what_?”

It was probably the second-most startled question Aziraphale had ever heard from Crowley. He rolled his eyes even though Crowley couldn’t see it.

“My cellular phone, dear boy. I’m sure you’re familiar with those devices.”

“You’ve _never_ mentioned having a cellphone. Where the Hell have you been hiding it?”

“In my glove compartment, generally. I keep it for emergencies, that sort of thing.”

“Wait—it’s not a _car phone_ , is it? One of those big blocky things from the ‘90s? ‘80s? Whenever that was?”

“No, don’t be ridiculous, my dear. It’s just an ordinary cellular phone, only a few years old. It’s not one of those overcomplicated new ones like yours, of course.”

“It’s a flip phone, isn’t it?” Crowley’s voice was gleeful.

Aziraphale fidgeted. “There’s nothing wrong with a flip phone. In any case, I’ll tell you my number so that you can write it down, and call me when—”

“ _No_ ,” Crowley interrupted, “don’t be _ridiculous_ ; how’m I gonna write it down? Call me from it, and then I’ll save the number. That’s how phones work these days, angel.”

“ _You’re_ ridiculous, dear boy, but very well.”

A few minutes later, Aziraphale had successfully retrieved his phone and called Crowley from his car.

“Oh, hello—it’s me, Aziraphale.”

“I _knowwwww_ ,” Crowley groaned. “And I can’t believe you’ve had a phone all this time and never said. Why didn’t you tell me? That would have saved a lot of, of, time…a…couple of times.”

“If you must know,” Aziraphale said, pursing his lips at the part of the phone that was presumably its mouthpiece, “it’s because I keep it for strictly personal purposes. I haven’t let anyone at work know the number. It’s a…well, a boundary. In fact, I’d very much appreciate you not mentioning it to anyone in the department.” He’d only given his cellular number to three people, ever, and they were all part of his church, though he didn’t see any need to tell Crowley that.

“’Course, ‘course,” Crowley promised quickly. “Wait, so not even Gabe knows you have a cellphone?”

“Not even _Tracy_ knows, my dear.”

A slight pause. “Huh,” said Crowley.

He chose the Bastille, since one needed familiar and comforting food at a time like this. They had a successful lunch, if by “successful” one meant trying Carmine’s delightful new crème brulee (she torched the top personally, perhaps enjoying it a bit too much) and largely avoiding discussion of the Basics course.

“Um,” said Crowley, his sunglasses tracking Aziraphale’s spoon after he’d savored his last bite of the crème brulee, “errhhh, we’ve been meeting all this month so you can help me with the—the course.” He waved an arm in what might have been the direction of the Down South campus. “So, we could, nnngggghhh, keep meeting next month, to help you? Y’know, just me returning the favor?”

“Oh, _could_ we?” Aziraphale was startled at the rush of relief he felt. “You wouldn’t mind?”

Crowley opened and closed his mouth, his eyebrows knitting together spectacularly. “Mind—'course I wouldn’t _mind_. I’m the one offering. Besides, you saved my ass this term, nnrrrr, ‘r at least my sanity—why would I _mind_? For fuck’s sake, angel.”

“Oh, thank you,” said Aziraphale. “It’s really very kind of you.”

“Shut up; I’m not kind. Returning a favor. ‘S different.”

“Of course it is, my dear.”

It wasn’t at all the summer he had planned, Aziraphale reflected some weeks later, near the end of July, as he fetched his and Crowley’s mail from Tracy’s office. (They’d resumed that habit after Aziraphale had to extract Crowley from a conversation in which the summer’s new Eric, whose name was Drew, was enthusing about the selfie article’s contention that “modern life gives us the tools to mark our presence far more easily and simultaneously far less tangibly than at any prior point in history,” which “really made me, uh, think.”) But Aziraphale had to admit that, despite the lack of tasty Appalachia tours and the undeniable strain of the Basics course’s demands, he _had_ enjoyed his Saturday lunches with Crowley. From a professional standpoint, of course. They were very…productive. Professionally productive. Indeed, over the course of both Summer 1 and Summer 2, they’d cobbled together a modified curriculum that was…passably useful. If they’d been given free reign, Aziraphale felt that they could have created something genuinely valuable. Of course that was impossible, but as it was…well, at least they’d succeeded in keeping the summer from being utterly horrible.

Back in his office after dropping off Crowley’s mail, Aziraphale flexed his shoulders and glanced at his email before dragging himself back into his end-of-term grading—

And froze.

“ _Come by my office_ ,” read the subject line of his most recent email.

Gabriel’s worst email subject line.

Aziraphale felt his chest tightening, his throat closing. Surely Gabriel couldn’t have heard about—

He twisted his fingers, his mind immediately teeming with all of the various possible misdeeds that Gabriel could have heard about—altering the Basics course curriculum, helping Crowley alter the Basics course curriculum, _collaborating with_ Crowley on the Basics course curriculum, lunches with Crowley for nearly a year, cooperating with Crowley instead of…thwarting him…during the Apocalypse class—

Oh dear—the trouble _Crowley_ could be in, if _his_ side found out and—and misinterpreted their interactions—

Aziraphale’s hand was shaking as he opened the email.

“ _Aziraphale_ ,” it started brusquely—Gabriel’s second-worst salutation. “ _Need to chat. Come by ASAP_.”

There was no point in waiting. Aziraphale stood and adjusted his bowtie. His legs felt like wooden blocks, but he forced them to make walking motions that carried him to Gabriel’s office.

Both Gabriel and Sandy were there, talking in low, darkly concerned voices, which did nothing at all to soothe Aziraphale’s nerves.

“Oh good, there you are,” said Gabriel. Phrases like _it’s about time_ and _it took you long enough_ clustered thickly around him. “Come in, close the door, have a seat.”

Aziraphale obeyed, sitting in the smaller chair closer to Gabriel, since Sandy was taking the larger one directly across from Gabriel. This put Sandy between Aziraphale and the door, in a way that made Aziraphale think of guards and prison wardens.

“We have to talk about the Apocalypse course,” Gabriel said, then rolled his eyes and sighed. “The _Literature and Language Skills course_ , of course. I know it’s a disagreeable subject, but we have to discuss your student evaluation ratings. The course ratings _and_ the instructor ratings.”

“Of-of course,” said Aziraphale, lacing his fingers so that he wouldn’t fidget with his lapels. “Ah—what aspect of them, exactly?” The course itself had received very good ratings, and Aziraphale’s instructor ratings had been quite good as well—generally in keeping with his usual course ratings, though a bit higher than usual for an undergraduate course. He hadn’t asked Crowley about _his_ instructor ratings; it would have seemed a bit rude.

“The course ratings were very high,” said Gabriel. It sounded like an accusation.

“I—I suppose they were…reasonably good,” Aziraphale replied, unsure how to apologize for good course ratings. “Nothing—nothing extraordinary, necessarily.”

“They were the highest the Apocalypse course has ever received,” said Sandy, in a tone that made Aziraphale’s eyes snap to him like those of a hunted animal.

“Oh—ah—is that so? I—I wasn’t aware.”

“And your instructor ratings were very high,” Gabriel went on.

“Err…they were comparable to—to most faculty instructor ratings, I should think,” Aziraphale equivocated.

“Crowley’s were _also_ very high.” Gabriel’s expression was that of a meat-and-potatoes man confronting sushi for the first time. “His average rating was exactly the same as yours, in fact.”

“That’s—that’s a bit improbable, I suppose,” Aziraphale ventured.

“We would have preferred your ratings to be higher than his, of course,” Gabriel sniffed.

“Well,” Aziraphale stalled, as he wracked his brain for all the evidence of thwarting he’d filed away, “of course _he_ was rated well. He’s very up to date, and clever, and witty, and…and brilliant, and—” Oh.

“It almost sounds like you like him,” Gabriel observed, his tone almost-neutral in a way that set off Aziraphale’s alarm bells. Well, the few that hadn’t already been busily ringing since he’d received Gabriel’s summoning email.

“Ah—I meant from the students’ perspective, of course,” Aziraphale backpedaled quickly. “Naturally _they_ see him that way. Personally, I—I loathe him.” He swallowed. Gabriel’s face moved in the direction of approval. “That is, I respect his professional qualifications”—no, no, shift the steering wheel again; that not-exactly-neutral expression was returning—“well, as much as I _can_ respect _those_ type of professional qualifications, which is very little. Almost none, I’m afraid.”

Gabriel was nodding with what was probably supposed to be sympathy.

“That’s why I wanted to talk to you in private,” he said seriously. Aziraphale managed to keep himself from glancing at Sandy. “I hate to say it, but I have bad news.”

Aziraphale reflected that Gabriel probably had genuinely no idea of the ice-water flood that sentence produced in his gut.

“I…I see.”

“Yep,” said Gabriel, shaking his head. “The department has been commended for the results of the student evaluations of the course this semester.”

He said “the department has been commended” in the way one would say “the department has been found dead in a ditch.”

“I see,” Aziraphale said again, mentally reviewing to be sure he did, in fact, know the definition of “commended.” “I’m sorry—you did say _bad_ news?”

“Well, bad news for you,” Gabriel said. “I guess it’s good news for the department as a whole, and I appreciate you thinking of it that way!” He punctuated this with one of his hearty shoulder punches. Aziraphale tried not to flinch. “But for you personally, it means that Mac wants you and Crowley to…well…give a repeat performance next spring.”

Aziraphale felt exceptionally dim-witted while he pieced this together. “You mean…she wants…Crowley and me to, well, teach the course again? Next year?”

Gabriel gave an exaggerated wince. “Yep, I’m afraid so. And I know it’s tough, since I know how much you dislike working with him, being asked to do it all over again. But when I thought it through, I thought, you know, you can always count on Aziraphale to think about the greater good.” He’d put a hand on Aziraphale’s shoulder. Aziraphale was trying hard not to think of predatory animals with giant paws.

“Ah—I—yes. The, ah, the greater good. Naturally, I’d put that first. If—if it’s what Mac wants, and it’s good for the department, I—I’m sure I can, well, tolerate working with him again. For the good of the department, of course. That is, for the good of the Literature side.”

Gabriel’s smile cranked up to its usual beaming state, and he gave Aziraphale’s shoulder a squeeze before releasing it. Presumably the blood flow would return to normal shortly.

“That’s the best thing about you, Aziraphale! It just goes to show, what I always say—you don’t have to have the longest list of accomplishments. The most important thing is being a team player! I knew I could count on you to take one for the team!”

When Aziraphale was finally released, he tottered back to his office, closed the door, and sank into the nearest chair, scrubbing his hands across his face. After a few seconds of calming breaths, he pulled out his cellphone and called Crowley.

“’Lo?”

“Oh, hello, it’s me, Aziraphale.”

“I _know_ , angel. What’s up?”

“Have you, ah, had a conversation with B about…our class?”

“About getting commended by Mac herself?” The grin in Crowley’s voice warmed Aziraphale straight through the telephone lines. Well, air waves. Or…satellite signals. Or…whatever was used these days.

“Well, the _department_ being commended, strictly speaking, I believe. And…and that we’re to teach it again?”

“Yep.” It would have been lovely to see Crowley’s widening grin at that point. “Just had that conversation. Are you heading home?”

“I was about to, yes.”

“I’ll meet you there. Forty-five minutes.”

Forty-five minutes later, Crowley was at Aziraphale’s door, with—

“I brought chocolates!” he said, proudly holding up a pink box.

“You brought…you brought _flowers_ ,” Aziraphale said blankly, staring at the riot of color in Crowley’s other hand.

“And wine,” Crowley agreed, heading for the kitchen. “Figured, let’s have ourselves a celebration. It’s not like anyone else is going to celebrate for us. You have a vase somewhere, right?”

“Oh. Oh dear. Probably, yes.” Aziraphale opened a cabinet packed with glassware.

“Damn, sorry, I should have gotten one—‘s just grocery store flowers, they didn’t come with one, and I figured you’d have plenty, ‘cause I’m sure you’ve gotten flowers lots of times.”

Aziraphale stopped rummaging and stared around the cabinet door at Crowley. “Who’d be giving me flowers?”

Crowley’s eyebrows arched high above his sunglasses. “Unngggg…boyfriends?”

“I don’t exactly have very many of those sitting around, dear.” Aziraphale spread his hands, indicating the boyfriendless state of his surroundings.

“Yeah—I mean—errrk—no—but you _have_. I know you have, you’ve mentioned ‘em. They’ve gotta have given you flowers, right?”

Aziraphale turned back to rummaging in the cabinet. “Certainly not recently.” He knew the exact number of times he’d been given flowers; it was zero. Not exactly hard to keep track of. “Ah, here we are.” He shifted three coffee mugs and carefully extracted a clear glass vase, square-shaped with sharply-cut diamond patterns.

“See?” said Crowley. “You have a vase; you’ve obviously gotten flowers before.”

“I’d better rinse it,” Aziraphale muttered, giving it a critical once-over as he moved to the sink. He’d gotten the vase to hold a floral arrangement for he’d bought for Raphael, to apologize for something that he would probably remember as soon as he thought about it for very long. It had taken him a while to find a vase with a design that suited Raphael’s Art Deco interest at the time. Raphael hadn’t bothered to take it with him when they’d broken up. Either time.

Crowley’s flowers, once installed in the vase, were a brightly cheery complement to Aziraphale’s comfortably battered kitchen table. Aziraphale found himself smiling at them a few times as he and Crowley made their way through the wine and celebratory sushi from Aziraphale’s favorite place. Why didn’t he have flowers more often? Or ever? There was nothing stopping him from buying flowers for himself, to brighten the place up. It was silly to wait for someone else to give them to him—and, at this point, highly unlikely as well.

“Commended by the dean and they act like it’s a dirty secret, for fuck’s sake,” Crowley was grumbling. “Weirdest department I’ve ever been in. Welllllll, no it’s not. But still”—he pointed the wine bottle at Aziraphale (they’d dispensed with the glasses by then and were passing the bottle back and forth)—“ten years ago, I’da noped out by now, probably.”

Aziraphale blinked, and bit into another chocolate. For the first time ever, he was grateful for coconut filling—he made a face at it to cover the way the bottom had abruptly dropped out of his stomach.

“Really?” he asked Crowley, keeping his eyes on the offending chocolate as he set it aside.

“’M not saying it would have been smart,” Crowley elaborated. “I have a…a history.” He gestured in a way that did not clarify this at all. In all their conversations over the past year, he and Aziraphale had always managed to skirt around their respective employment histories. Aziraphale didn’t entirely trust his voice, so he settled for giving Crowley a quizzical look.

Crowley sighed. “Fine,” he mumbled. “The short version ‘s that I went up for tenure in my first job and didn’t get approved. I’d pissed a couple of people off. So I had to, y’know, find a new position. Was at the new place for a couple years, pissed people off again, wasn’t sure if I’d make tenure there either. So I left before I went up. Did the same thing a couple more times. That’s me, right there—get the fuck out before they can…you know.”

Aziraphale wasn’t, in fact, entirely sure that he knew, but he _did_ know that the combination of bitterness and vulnerability in Crowley’s voice and face (the sunglasses had been shed some time ago) was twisting something in his own gut. He put as much concentration as he could into selecting his next chocolate, while he waited for his urge to wrap his arms around Crowley to pass.

“I can’t—I can’t imagine that you’d have any trouble with tenure here,” he offered, still looking at the chocolates. “They’ve got you on the same three-year fast track that I took, and your qualifications are—are excellent, of course.”

Crowley gazed at him—well, at the side of his face, since Aziraphale was keeping his gaze on the rippled top of what he hoped was a dark chocolate truffle—and took another swig of the wine. “Euurrr. Thanks. Hope you’re right. I kinda…kinda need this one to work out.” He sounded…forlorn. Aziraphale put far more care than necessary into picking up his chosen chocolate, as Crowley continued, glumly: “I’m tired, y’know? And places start looking at your CV funny when you’ve got a long string of positions. Doesn’t really put you at the top of the pack.”

Aziraphale felt a twinge of guilt as he remembered his own thoughts about Crowley’s list of positions, back before they’d met. “I thought perhaps you enjoyed…oh, the excitement. Of moving to new places, that sort of thing. In fact”—he again found that he couldn’t quite look at Crowley—“I wouldn’t have thought that a place like Tadfield could hold your interest for very long, really.”

“Ehhh…” Crowley said, and the darker expression was unexpectedly dispelled by an absurd grin. “Nahhhh, I’ve got you to keep me on my toes here, angel.”

Aziraphale choked into the wine bottle. “Oh dear,” he said. None of his other potential responses were suitable to be expressed aloud. “Mmm,” he ventured, eventually.

“Anyway, why’re we talking about work?” Crowley demanded. “It’s a Friday night. Fuck work. Tell me about—I dunno, the weather. But you can’t just say it’s gonna be hot.”

“I would _never_ just say it’s going to be hot,” Aziraphale replied indignantly. “That would be like saying _you_ drive a shiny black car. Or enjoy listening to—to bebop.”

Crowley smiled, that particular and very rare smile that always made Aziraphale wonder—did Crowley realize how sunnily it glowed? At the moment, it brightened the room at least as much as the flowers.

“Go on, then,” Crowley invited, and even if he was making fun, Aziraphale couldn’t deny that smile.

“Oh, very well,” he huffed, for the principle of the thing, and then started on explaining stationary fronts.

By the time they relocated to the living room, they’d gotten around to the language of flowers. Crowley stretched himself across the couch as his Google search led him to the conclusion that their grocery store flower arrangement indicated, “I apologize for your innocence; my absent friends have royal dignity; your letter is a new mother.”

Some time after that, when they were arguing over the definition of bebop, and whether the music of Queen could be classified in that category, Crowley’s response time began to slow. Aziraphale watched as his eyes drifted closed and his breathing slowed, and didn’t try to suppress a fond smile. There was no one around to see it, after all.

He went to fetch a blanket once Crowley’s breathing had hit that particular depth that meant he would remain asleep for the next few hours. It was funny, he reflected, that he could now classify the different levels of Crowley’s breathing. It wasn’t as though Crowley fell asleep here all that often—but evidently, Aziraphale realized now, it had happened often enough that they had a bit of a routine: Crowley drifted to sleep, Aziraphale settled a blanket over him and closed himself in his bedroom, Crowley left sometime in the night, and Aziraphale woke in the morning to find the blanket folded and a friendly note left on a table somewhere.

This time, as Aziraphale discovered the next morning, the note was tucked under the flower vase. Crowley had apparently tried to leave a message in the language of flowers, if the crossed-out attempts at somewhat flower-shaped doodles were anything to judge by.

“ _I give up_ ,” Crowley had finally written in his normal angular handwriting, with a little arrow pointing toward the abandoned flower sketches. “ _They’re worse than emojis_. _This probably says ‘my heart pines for socialism’ or something. Have a good Saturday, angel—good luck with the grading._ ”

The grading was just as much of a slog as ever, but Aziraphale found that it was alleviated, just a bit, by being able to look up at the cheerful flower arrangement still brightening his table. At lunchtime, he bought a new vase, a clear glass one with an elegant curve to it that reminded him of a slim waist with—well, never mind. He threw Raphael’s old vase away—it had never matched his own style anyway, and the sharp-edged pattern had always threatened to cut his fingers.

In any case, the new one looked far better with Crowley’s flowers.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! I hope you've enjoyed this! Comments of any type will absolutely make my day!


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